
Book ^.^^ifeJr4L_ 



( 

L I TERARY 



V^i 



*• 'i-Xi't 



AND 



RELIGIOUS SKETCHES 



B'Y REV. JOHN NEWLAND MAFFITT 

Of the Methodist Episcopal Churclu 



i'RESS OP T. HARRIES, 72 EQW; 



WDCCCXXXII. 



1 






I \ 



•30456 



' Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1832, by T. Harries, in 
the Clerk's office of the District Court of the United States, for the Southern 
District of New- York.' 




— i 

Thomas Harries, Printer, 72 Bowery.^ f 



CONTENTS. 



Page, 

Introduction, . - - 5 

The Deluge, . - - 9 

Wesleyan Missionary Hymn, - - 15 

Summei field, - - - 16 

The Mandate, ... 21 

Infant Schools, ... 22 

The Missionary Enterprise, - - 23 

The Sacramental Feast, - - 29 

Religion of Ancient Mexico, . - 30 

Algiers, a Sonnet, ... 33 

A Plea for Africa, - - - 33 

God, .... 47 

Summer, . - - 48 

Saturday Evening, - - - 50 

George the IV. — King of England, - - 51 

Religion, - - i - 54 

Religion and Poetry, . _ 56 

Saul of Tarsus, a Sonnet, - - 60 

Centennial Ode, by Charles Sprague, - 60 

John auincy, L. L. D. - - 62 

All is Vanity, ... 63 

Part of an Address, - - - 64 

Sonnet — Constantinople, - - 71 

Montgomery's World before the Flood - 72 

The Autumnal Evening, - - 74 

Loch Lomond, - - - 75 

Right Rev. Reginald Hebet," D. D. - - 77 

Sonnet, - . - - 81 

Our Country, - - - 81 

Glory, ... - 95 

Adventures of a ContrlI)ution Box, - - 96 



IV 



Plainiive Harp of Judea, 
Pain,, 

The Parting, 
Aftectioiis Last Proof, - 
Why sliould we Die ? - 
French Revolution, 
Farewell to Summer, - 
Ancient Egypt, 
Ireland and America, - 
Loss of the Hornet, 
The Bible, 
The Consumptive, 
Infidelity Destroys Itself, 
Jerusalem Overthrown, 
Man of Pleasure, - ' 

Star in the East, 
The Mount of Olives, 
Passage of the Red Sea, 
Washington at the Delaware, 
• The Coming of Christ, 
Asylum for Oppressed Humanity, 
Napoleon, 

General Richard Montgomery, 
Aurora Borealis, 
The Eclipse, 
The Year mdcccxxx, 
Address, - 
Loneliness, 
African Mission, 
WelUngton, 

The Christian's Encouragements, 
Biblical Sublimity, 
Stony Point, 
The Faithful Saying, - 
Extracts, - 
Primitive Christianity. - 



99 
100 
101 
102 
104 
105 
109 
109 
111 
113 
114 
120 
121 
126 
127 
132 
133 
137 
142 
143 
148 
151 
160 
167 
168 
168 
170 
175 
177 
183 
185 
198 
205 
210 
220 
220 



INTRODUCTION^. 



This book is called into being by 
the voice of friendship. It is a slight 
memorial which the author would leave 
behind him to perpetuate his memory 
among the virtuous and the good. The 
object of writing it will be obtained if it 
shall promote generous sentiments, shall 
elevate the standard of the morality and 
purify the taste of the reader. To deepen 
the impressions of a short acquaintance, 
to rescue from oblivion the labors of hours 
that have been snatched from the absorb- 
ing routine of public duties, and to repeat 
from the quiet page some thoughts that 
may have been uttered from the pulpit, 



VI 



are motives of sufficient strength with 
the author to induce him to gather up a 
small volume of fugitive compositions, 
many of which have been before present- 
ed to the public in various forms and 
through various channels. Although the 
subjects may be diversified, yet the author 
hopes the unity of one spirit rules in them 
all— the spirit of kindness to man and 
love to God. 

The noiseless flight of time, which, 
with hasty wing like a bird of passage, 
is bound to another clime, renders it most 
important that what we would do on 
earth should be done quickly. The track 
made on the ocean sands by the sea-fowl 
is not more evanescent than the life of 
man. The warning of inspiration— work 
while the day lasts, for the night soon 
cometh wherein no man can work— is 
reiterated by the united voices of nature 
and providence. Whether it be the work 
ol repentance, or of literature, or of art, 
soon it must be done, or an irrevocable 



Vll 



voice will pronounce it forever undone. 
These considerations may apologise for 
many defects in the follov^ing pages, 
arising from hasty preparation or the 
pressure of weighty avocations. It is 
very possible that many things in this 
volume may be obnoxious to a fastidious 
criticism which would rather contemplate 
a man's apparel than the heart which 
a mean attire may embosom. But to 
such criticism I have only to plead a 
purity of motive which * smiles at the' 
critic's * dagger and defies its point'— 
while it would be almost a shame to 
make a book so perfect that those whose 
trade is fault-finding should have no 
exercise for their vocation. 

Not to the haughty spirit, lifted far 
above the level of a fellow humanity— not 
to those who are too proud to use the 
powers which their Maker has entrusted 
them with for the furtherance of human 
happiness— not to those who would scorn 
to learn, even from a child, the simplest 



Vlll 



element of knowledge, does the author 
dedicate this book. It belongs rather 
to the humble christian who may yet 
have a pure and classic mind, redolent 
with the aspirations of poetry as well as 
devotion. To those who seek for glory 
and immortality— to those who would 
pluck the most fragrant flowers of earth 
to weave a chaplet for the brows of their 
Redeemer— this book is most respectfully 
and affectionately dedicated. 

J^ew York, March, 1832. 



THE DELUGE. 

This may be classed with no other event. It stand:- 
aioiie. The recorded transactions of men, the desolating 
|JOwer of the elements, the cracks, tremors and eruptions 
of the crazy earth, may be graduated by some scale of 
comparative sublimity, force or terror. With occurrences 
of the one kind there are similar records to compare, ' 
and the mind enjoys a secret pleasure in balancing the 
recent evil with the kindred one more remote. This 
satisfaction arises in part from the grateful conviction 
forced upon the mind that there is a demonstration oi" 
method in the recurrence of calamity — that the event, 
however distressing, has a parallel — and, as the earth, 
on which the hopes of men are resting, survived 
the antecedent dispensation, so, even now, when the 
thunders have done uttering their voices, or the spirit 
of the storm has passed by, or the spasms of organic- 
matter have quieted themselves, the interrupted order 
of nature will revert to its own place. It will soon be 
over, is the uppermost thought in danger — and then, 
1* 



10 

calculations may be made, projects entered upon, the 
future bent into the circle of the present, and man, 
once more, seem to himself the lord of the creation. 

But in a new, untried calamity, appalling circum- 
stances astound us ; the courage of the bravest cowers 
under the approaches of a foe, uniting tremendous 
strength with unknown rules of action — and unearthly 
terrors gather themselves, like a cloud of fearfulness, 
over a scene of undefined, measureless ruin. Such 
was the deluge. It was poured out from the windows 
of heafven, it gushed up from the boiling fountains of 
the great deep without measure, parallel, antecedent, or 
genealogy. This is the event of one name ; its genus 
one ; its species one ; its fashioning after its own fearful 
image, casting its shadows forward in the revelations of 
Noah's prophetic spirit. 

All nations own this occurrence as indisputable ; and 
a thousand venerable traditions testify of the deluge of 
waters along with the water marks which are abundantly 
found in the highest mountains, and may be identified 
in the geological structure of the continents and the 
islands. No element, perhaps, excepting that of fire, 
could have wrought such changes — for, when the 
shoreless waters subsided, the fragments of the broken 
up world were tossing to and fro and rounding them- 
selves into a dry orb, under far other than antediluvian 
features and combinations, the retiring waves sported 
with the ancient mountain tops as with pebbles, and 
surge after surge laid up on high the immense ridges 



11 

of new modelled hills with deep and lengthened vales 
between. 

There is one peculiar circumstance connected with 
antediluvian remains not a little astonishing ; — it is, that 
human skeletons have never been found, nor the ruins 
of a single edifice or monument, evidently belonging to 
the world before the flood. Man and his works perished. 
At intervals, indeed, the naturalist finds imbedded in the 
secondary formations of rock the gigantic bones of the 
Tapir and other animals of the old world whose species 
seem to have become extinct in the deluge ; but the 
bare fleshless skeleton of a man who proudly rejected 
the spirit warnings of prophecy and lifted up his haughty 
looks towards the first black drops of the predicted 
storm, has probably never been revealed by the sunlight 
of heaven. The new world, drenched, reorganized, 
purified, was as if man had never been upon its vivifying 
bosom. The blood of ancient violence had been washed 
away. The proud cry of millions had subsided to the 
feeble supplications of eight individuals, who stood alone 
in a strange, voiceless, unpeopled land, by the side of a 
rude altar, from whence the curling smoke of sacrifice 
went up, answered by the beautiful Iris, God's bow of 
promise in the cloud. 

An event of such severe application, as might have 
been expected, has taken a deep hold on human sym- 
pathy, terror or curiosity ; and almost every being, who 
has become an inhabitant of earth since that time, has 
had his thoughts, to some extent, busied in exploring the 



1^ 

gloom and storm of that sunless season. Every spirit 
has peered out upon the watery grave of kings, of proud, 
aspiring nobles, vi^hose generations ran directly back to 
Eden, and who still felt in the purple flood of life at 
their hearts the slowly diminishing impulses of the recent 
immortality of human nature. Genius, in eloquence, 
in song, or on the canvass, has often kindled over this 
theme and reaped fresh harvests of earthly immortality 
on this wide field of universal death. 

It is not our purpose to spread the glorious or the 
gloomy colors of fancy, in mingled drapery, over the 
deluge scenery. More true sublimity lurks in the account 
of this event given in the sacred records than may be 
found in the most labored, minute, or graphic displays 
of inventive probability. We follow the words of God ; 
and, like the pioneer raven sent out from the window 
of the ark, hover a moment longer over this stormy 
resting place between the world's creation and its end. 
The warning was long by the voice of Noah — and longer 
still by his unremitted labors in building the ark of safety 
for himself, his family, and those beasts of the field and 
fowls of the air who might be destined to propagate 
their kind thoughout the solitudes of the new world. — 
Threatened judgment comes on tardy wing — for God is 
merciful beyond earthly conception of the most merciful. 
Arrived at last, it is sudden — as if the kind Creator of 
humanity was unwilling to hang out his protracted, 
unavailing terrors over those whose incorrigible obstinacy 
in sin had brought down destruction upon theni. Many 
graphic writers, and the pencil of the artist, have united 



in presenting a picture of long continued struggle — the 
black agony of horrid death — the arduous ascent to the 
jnountain summit — the wild shout of pursuing waters — 
the cutting off of every hope — the sight of the buoyant 
ark outriding the storm — and the wild, unutterable 
wrestlings of the spirit of despair, tormenting the drown- 
ing nullions in their death struggle. But we cannot follow 
the path of such. 

The painter, whose heaving canvass discloses an 
enormous serpent winding himself around the topmost 
rock of the highest mountain, while all around roll the 
seething waters, reveals a strong probability of nature — 
or when he paints a cataract near a summit where the 
laws of nature would forbid a river to flow — or when 
he defies the doctrine of gravitation and shows the angry, 
foaming masses of water,stretching upward, like reversed 
waterfalls, he may be sustained by the solemn evidence 
of recorded causes, if not effects. But let him people 
the last, the highest, visible elevations with drenched, 
miserable, living beings,he gives needless and uncalled-for 
severity to a judgment too tremendous to exaggerate. 
Long before the highest hills were topped with foam, all 
earthly life, except that afloat in the ark and that whose 
breath is the deep sea itself, had probably become 
extinct. When man punishes man, he sustains the 
poor, shivering form of his brother in slow torments, 
taking life in excruciating measures, inch by inch — but 
the judgments of God, slow in their approach, are 
sudden in their transaction. The calamity comes. — 



14 

The public mind seems stupified ; and, in a moment, 
the Red Sea envelopes a host; the earth swallows 
thousands ; fires from heaven wrap cities in flames ; 
earthquake sinks them in dust, or the howling currents 
of the broken up seas and the dreary descent of floods 
from the opened windows of heaven finish the catastrophe 
of the world before the deluge. 

There is one point of lonely sublimity in this tragic 
event not yet delineated by the pencil. It is an after 
occurrence, when every earthly groan had long been 
Imshed and the sea-weed shrouds had been woven 
around more millions than perhaps ever will find footing 
again at once upon our earth. The heavens had wept 
their last drop, and, v/ith a pale blue aspect, reflected 
nothing but a heaving counterpart below — a dark mirror 
of unbroken waters, rolling to the lunar influence 
without a shore to graduate the tides. Those v/aters 
were receding. Evaporation lay upon their bosom, 
and curling mists, with a fragrance like freshly opened 
furrows of spring, floated on the dim edges of the horizon 
where sky and billow met, and there seemed to form 
mimic mountains, shadowy resemblances or mockeries 
of the world that was. From a window of the ark, a 
dark wing essays its flight. A raven, the first of birds 
to navigate the atmosphere fluid of the new world, comes 
out, after a year's confinement, and flaps his pinions 
between sea and sky. The flight of this pioneer, who 
returns no more, and the visionary line of vapor 
mountains towards which he directs his course, and the 



15 



croaking of disappointment, as he finds them thin air — 
together with the solemn silence of the buried creation 
below, form an assemblage of lonely, impressive images, 
more truly affecting than the fury and affright of the 
deluge onset. 



WESLEYAN MISSIONARY HYMN, 

Sung in the church in John-street, J^ew-York, at the anniversary of the 
Methodist Missionary Society. 

Tune— 'Elim's Well.' 

Hear the gospel trumpet sounding 

Louder than the ocean's roar ! 
Hear it from the hills resounding, 

Break in music on the shore ! 
Hear it, mourner, 

Let thy sorrows flow no more. 

Where the Gothic altars solemn 

Fed a feeble, flickering flame, 
Wesley, leaning on a column, 

Call'd on God, his Saviour's name ; 
Then from heaven, 

Fires of living glory came ! 

Brighter with his mission glowing, 
Earth grew sweet with Sharon's rose ; 

Songs, like those of Eden flowing, 
Broke the rubric's dull repose. 

Then in power. 
Banner, star, and cross arose. 



16 

See another angel flpng 
O'er the broad Atlantic wave ! 

Asb'ry Hfts his trumpet crying, 
• Jesus came a world to save.' 

Happy tidings ! 
Millions in the fountain lave. 

Now, a thousand trumpets thunder 
Deep along the vaulted sky ; 

Now they part the spheres asunder, 
While the lightning arrows fly — 

Deep conviction 
Fills with tears the sinner's eye. 

O'er the silver lake of Simcoe, 
Hear the Indian chorus swell ! 

Softly blending with night's echo 
All these strains of Jesus tell ; 

Precious music, 
Like the gush of Elim's well. 

Blessed Jesus ! reign forever ! 

Seated high on victory's car ; 
Bend the nations to thy sceptre, 

Wave thine ensigns from afar. 
Hallelujah ! 

Thou art Christ the morning star. 



SUMMERFIELD. 

The communion in which the beloved Summerfield 
labored, the entire community of the American church 
who had seen him, or heard of him, and thousands in 
Europe sorrowing for his untimely death, cut down as 



* 17 

it were in the very freshness of his morning bloom — 
anxiously expected, in his memoirs, to see the excellent 
saint once more on earth. They expected to see his 
better part, unclaimed by the grave, come up before 
them in all its loveliness, breathing peace upon them as 
it passed, and still eloquently pleading, till the end of 
time, the same precious cause to which he was devoted 
far life. The circumstance of his feeble health, together 
with his untiring, successful labors, had awakened a 
strong sympathy in his favor. When the immense 
multitudes that waited on his ministry saw, in the 
exhausting flame of his eloquence, the fire that was 
consuming the victim on the altar, they felt as if a 
martyr was before them. How powerful is such 
preaching ! Let not the cold-hearted man, the frozen- 
blooded critic, presume to censure labors for God 
under such circumstances. One sermon, poured out 
in the sacrificial flame of life expiring in the kindling 
brightness of immortality, will be very likely to do more 
good than the mighty tomes of theology that may have 
consumed, iazy centuries in their structure. 

It is here we find one cause of complaint against 
Summerfield's biographer ; he censures him over and 
over again, for laboring under the pressure of ill health. 
But could his biographer have seen, as we saw, that his 
most powerful eflbrts for God were those put forth in 
nature's feebleness, when the lamp of life was faintly 
gleaming, like the solitary taper that burns itself away 
in the chamber of death, he would not have censured — 
we confidently believe he would have applauded the 
2 



18 

self-devotedness of the saint rather than have blamed 
the rashness of the self-wasting individual. The deep 
and well-founded impression which had seated itself on 
Summerfield's mind, that his course must be a short one, 
and that what he accomplished for heaven must be done 
speedily, was, of itself, a sufficient stimulus to call him 
out, with a trumpet's voice, to labor while his brief 
day lasted. 

Another cause of complaint which we prefer, with 
much tenderness, against Summerfield's biographer, is, 
that he had not been a witness of his preaching, nor a 
confidential friend — the sharer of his bosom thoughts, 
his cares, joys, sorrows, triumphs, despondencies. He 
has, therefore, compiled a biography of Summerfield 
which may be satisfactory to those who never saw 
Summerfield — but, to those who have seen and tasted 
the sweet elements of his heavenly eloquence and the 
joys of his soothing converse, it does not fully reveal the 
image of their departed brother. An immense multitude 
must yet feel that Summerfield is no more — that he lives 
only in their fading remembrances. The pages of his 
biography, although very faithfully filled up from his 
correspondence, his journals and sketches of public 
addresses, do not develope the man. There stands in 
the pages a resemblance of Summerfield — but a mist, 
to eyes that have seen him, has gathered over the out- 
lines of the generous, devoted, soul-touching brother, 
and never shall they see him again, save in memory's 
vision, until they see him standing along with Wesley, 
with Whitefield, with Spencer, with Heber, before his 
Saviour's throne. 



19 

If it require a genius to take the lineaments of the 
human form, to spread over the dull canvass the speak- 
ing images of life, how much more requisite is genius to 
portray the lineaments of the immortal mind which has 
developed itself under a type of surpassing beauty ! — 
Montgomery could have written the life of Suramerfield 
had he been acquainted with him ; for, in the few 
extracts from the pen of Montgomery, found in the 
volume, the character and the soul of the dear servant 
of Jesus are spoken more fully than in all the biographer 
has written. A biographer had no need of dwelling on 
minute faults or imperfections in Summerfield's character 
in order to convince the thousands who were to read 
the book that he had not flattered the subject of his 
biography — it should have been his higher aim to have 
described, with the genius of truth, the elements of moral 
loveliness which produced such unparalleled emotions 
in the minds of the thousands before whom the brief, 
but beautiful being passed. 

The life of Summerfield, by Holland, should settle 
the question forever whether it were proper for strangers 
to be the biographers of men whose tenderness, purity 
and sweetness of daily action make up a moiety of their 
entire characters which is exceeded only by the power 
of their genius or eloquence. It will do very well for 
cool, collected strangers to write the lives of philosophers, 
statesmen, bookmen — for, in these departments, the 
transcripts, unerring and permanent, are alike tangible 
in any mood of mind, and faithfulness and elegance of 
combination are the needful requisitions for successful 



20 

biography. But Summerfield's glory was in his soul, in 
his eye, in his outpourings of benevolent emotions, in 
his passions, flowing out, to use his own expressive 
words, like molten gold, and begetting their like in every 
heart that bowed under their heavenly influence. 

Summerfield in gone. Earth beholds his face no 
more. His accents of purity reverberate no more in 
tlie house of prayer, the chambers of sorrow and death 
— nor shall they ever thrill again through the enchanted 
social circle. But a sweetness remains behind him- 
A fragrance is left where he trod. A glory lingers 
where the martyr passed. An offering blazing on the 
altars of holiness, the perfumes of his sacrifice fill a 
thousand temples. How sweetly rests the frame that 
was worn out in the service of Jesus ? When memory 
recalls him, how like an angel does he rise up from the 
dominions of death, the very personification of love, of 
friendship, of generosity, of truth, of meekness, of 
patience and heavenly ardor ! Thus death is conquered 
mid cannot keep his spoil — for, fresh in beauty, his 
friends, the thousands of Israel, shall call him forth at 
will until they go to his place to abide with him forever. 
The suff'rages of earth have placed his glorified spirit in 
heaven — for, while a stranger here below, none ever 
doubted his citizenship in that better country. What 
earth has lost, heaven has gained. With his life below 
fled his last groan. The paleness of mortality gave 
place to eternal bloom — and the feebleness of his nature 
caught immortal energies from the first gentle breezes 
of the better world. 



2J 

THE MANDATE. 

On to the west — dark Indian, westward go — 
And bathe thy weary feet in rills of snow 
Wild gusLing down the Rocky Mountains' steep- 
Thence, passing onward, tarry not to weep ; 
Thy tears would scorch the honey flowing soil, 
And deep, like molten lead, its verdure spoil — 
For tears of wrong shall bathe the thunder's wing 
And rouse the storm's portentous murmuring. 

Go westward, Indian, and return no more ! 
Thy doom is spoken in the mountain roar — 
The spirit of the winds hath groaned aloud — 
A grave is painted on the summer cloud — 
Forebodings hang their signals out at noon — 
Thy fate is written in the maniac moon, 
And eveiy bird of sombre wing and plume 
Hath croaked in prophecy of coming doom. 

Go v/estward, remnant of illustrious kmgs, 
Tracking the sun in its far wanderings ; 
O'erpass the ancient mounds, the desarts hoar, 
And stand on the Pacific's sounding shore — 
Then gaze upon its purple 'wave and say 
* There is no farther space where I can stray — 
No plain beyond — no hill — no dell— no lake, 
Where I the song of chase and joy may wake. 

The surge of pale-faced warriors from the sea 
Hath swallowed all that once belonged to me — 
And now it beateth on the Rocky Mountains 
And sweeps along Missouri's highest fountains, 
Too soon to break in foaming thunder here, 
And leave the red man desolate and sere. 
Ah, quit this world, ye forest kings— for lo 
There is no place for you the skies below. 
9.* 



22 

IxSTFANT SCHOOLS. 

it was a remark of Newton, at the height of his 
philosophical attainments, that he felt like a youth picking 
up pebbles on the shore of the great ocean of truth. 
This impressive remark was, no doubt, elicited by two 
considerations — one, that the farther the human mind 
progresses in the knowledge of natural science, the more 
boundless appears the field of inquiry — -and the other 
consideration alludes to the manner of acquiring know- 
ledge. The babe and the philosopher have but one way 
to acquire knowledge. Fact after fact must be learned by 
both — pebble after pebble must be picked up — until the 
governing principle is discovered and an entire class of 
subjects comprehended within its influence. 

There appears to be a single maxim at the foundation 
of infant school instruction wdiich should never be disre- 
garded by those who stand so near the fountain head of 
thought to direct its earliest currents — which is to teach 
truth. This maxim should include a limitation called 
for by the philosophy of mind — which is to teach the 
infant no truth without giving some reasons, or leading 
the learner's mind towards the causes from whence the 
effects are supposed to emanate, or the facts to be derived. 

This mode of instruction, in its earliest stages, presents 
the mind with the truth in its simplest forms — self 
evident, or palpable facts. The great secret of interest- 
ing the mind of an infant in the natural sciences and the 
usual routine of infant school instruction consists in the 
appeal made to his curiosity, his social feelings, love of 
amusement, and that satisfied state of mind induced by 



23 

learning and understanding any subject. It is, nideed, 
rather a late discovery that similar feelings pervade the 
infant school and the university. The acquisition of 
knowledge carries its own reward with it to the bosom 
of the philosopher and the nursing babe — and, now, that 
the way is discovered to make philosophers of our babes, 
it is harldly within the range of speculation to determine 
before hand what effects this new era of instruction will 
produce on the rising generation as they shall succeed to 
the duties of public and private life. 



THE MISSIONARY ENTERPRIZE. 

Since the pen of the eloquent Wayland has portrayed 
the dignity of the missionary enterprize, no one will 
attempt to retouch a picture which has been presented 
to admiring Europe and America, as one of those rare 
productions of genius, so much like angel visits on our 
earth, 'few and far between.' In VVayland's moral 
painting the coloring is lighted up by the purified fires of 
the sanctuary ; every tint is expressive of mental grandeur, 
and the shadowings involve the elements of sublimity. 
But the emotions of the morally sublime are not the 
deepest that are called out by the spirit of missions. 
There is an emotion, yet more touching and distinctive, 
which belongs to this enterprize — it is tenderness. 

Tenderness becomes humanity. It is better to weep 



24 

than laugh. The modern C^sar, when he wore the iron 
crown of France, never appeared more truly great than 
when, under the trembling light of the moon, he wept on 
the field of battle over the affectionate dog, keeping his 
death-watch beside the remains of a master whose voice 
should never salute him more. In days more distant 
from ours, Xerxes, whose command had enough of 
potency to burden the earth with the living masses of 
his army destined for the invasion of Greece, has left but 
one line in his history able to withstand the pelting storms 
of time — it is the record of the fact that he wept at the 
thought of death's wide harvest, spread out, like a map, 
in the plains below him. These tears of tender melan- 
choly remain, while every thing else the monarch may 
have done is lost, or losing itself, in the whirlpool of 
years. The King of kings, Jesus, the Judge of the earth, 
when on his earthly mission, left no pledges of his divine 
humanity more precious than his tears. He wept at the 
tomb of his friend — he wept over the snow-white towers 
of Jerusalem, destined by the righteous judgments of 
heaven to sudden ruin — and the Roman plough, passing 
over Moriah, could not, when it tore up the lowest 
foundations of the temple, obliterate the traces of a 
Saviour's tears. 

The soul goes out with the tears. Sublimity may fill 
the eye with fire, thrill through the frame, and give new 
intensity to the consciousness of existence ; tenderness 
carries a man from himself, and gives up his poured out 
affections into another's bosom. The one enlarges ; the 
other diffuses and distributes through the wide range of 



25 

humanity its own forgotten being. The one may be 
excited by the voice of the thunder speaking solemnly 
to the dark clouds, by the beetling brow of the mountain, 
by the sound of many waters; the other claims no 
affinities to inanimate bulk or brutal force — its gushing 
affections flow only at the touch of soul, or when the 
spirit of God breathes on the heart, disposing it to immense 
goodness and the overflowings of benevolence. 

Just before the missionary enterprize commenced, the 
earth presented one of its darkest historical pictures. 
War — war — with brazen throat bellowed from continent 
to continent, and howled over every sea. The truce 
was asked only to renew the stores of national venom 
and the preparations for national extermination. The 
remote shores of this western world were stained with 
fatricidal blood, and shaded with Gallic and British 
standards. Side by side, quiet at last in death, on the 
gory fields of the American revolution, lay the soldier of 
England, the soldier of France, of Hesse, of Prussia, of 
Poland — and yet the American struggle was only as 
a few drops before a horrible cataract of waters pre- 
cipitated by whirlwinds from the rent clouds to the earth, 
when compared with the gigantic water-spouts, that, at 
tlie commencement of the French revolution, walked 
terribly from the Champ de Mars to the Pyramids of 
the Nile, and from die Eternal City to the embers of 
Moscow, hurhng ancient dynasties to the howling winds, 
and forming bubble kingdoms of imposing, though 
transient, magnificence, where the beast of the iron foot 
had trodden down the concentrations of the feudal ages. 



26 

The world was full of widows and orphans. There was 
no comforter. Infidelity would not stand by its followers, 
either in life or death. None but the messengers of the 
Most High could impart consolation. They came ; 
angels, having the everlasting gospel to preach, brushed 
away the sulphur clouds of battle, and taught that the 
nations should love each other and learn war no more. 
As far as their silver trumpets have sounded and the 
ravishing music of their song been heard by the kingdoms 
of the earth, so far has sweet peace succeeded, and the 
milk of human kindness been poured out to the sorrowful 
and the afflicted. 

Examples speak a more impressive language than 
words. If the missionary spirit is that of tenderness, the 
lives, the sacrifices, self denials and labors of the 
missionary will be imbued with the dew of human 
kindness. Did the tenderness of the illustrious Coke 
acknowledge the common boundary of earthly affection ? 
Geographical limits were nothing to him. The wide 
earth he strode — the wide seas he sailed, in calm, in 
tempest, in shipwreck, carrying up with him, from the 
dripping wave, his only freight — the immortal love of the 
gospel for perishing souls. England, Ireland, France, 
the West Indian Islands and America, saw him again 
and again on his tender errands, more heavenly each 
time. And when his waning years prophesied of his 
coming rest,- he conceived the immense and almost 
boundless design of adding India to the fields inclosed 
by a Saviour's love. Hail, first missionary to India! 
Proudly rides thy bark before the fragrant land breeze 



27 

freshening from the Isle of Bourbon. Midnight lias arrived 
and gone again ;-^and, at thy accustomed hour of prayer, 
thy body is cold in death. Translated from the 
threshold of India to the kingdom of heaven, without 
sickness, at the holy hour of intercession, how great the 
change from prayer to everlasting praises ! 

A ship was seen bearing up against the obstinate 
winds of the great Indian ocean. It moved without 
proclamation, or shout, or defiance — bowing like a reed 
before the monsoon and glancing through the permitting 
waves like a peaceful swan. There were on board that 
ship two hearts united by the tenderest love — he, the 
missionary and minister of Jesus Christ — she, the lovely 
vine clinging to the oak for human support while she 
lifts up her rich, red clusters to heaven. One in Jesus 
— one in the glorious purpose of preaching the gospel to 
the heathen — one in the sacred union of souls — in the 
mingling of pure affections ; happy pair ! how shah the 
heavens glow with eternal beauty over your heads to 
shelter you from the scorchings of India's fierce haired 
sun — and how shall the balmy winds breathe health 
over the waste that these lovely pioneers of American 
benevolence to heathen India may long breathe the vita^ 
air, and go on together to life's far distant verge, loving 
the miserable more and more as their own love towards 
each other gains new strength at every successive stage 
of their Christlike career! ***** But why the 
tumult of baffling winds ? The coast of India, gained and 
lost, and gained and lost again, is like the tantalizing 
stream, that, fabulous, flies away from the thirsty Iip» 



28 

The vessel, like a sea bird, on ruffled wing, scours along 
under the angry brow of the tempest. Why does gloom' 
gather on the good man's brow? Why sits he pale and 
disconsolate — disturbed and agonizing, by the bed-side 
of his companion all the live long night — and why watch 
out the day? Shall she die — away from the land of 
her fathers — away from every tender tie save her husband 
and her God — even before the great work, for which she 
lived, for which she had renounced country and friends, 
had been commenced? Prepare thyself for bitterness, 
thou pale watcher ; for thou art, all lonely and sorrowful, 
by the dying bed of that devoted being whose heart, 
though breaking up in death, still clings to thee. Thou 
art the only witness of those last looks which reveal 
thoughts of impassioned fervor — far wandering ones that 
travel life over in a twinkling of time, recalling every 
tender thought, every endearing word. She steps alone 
into eternity, pointing with her farewell gesture to idola- 
trous India. In the spicy isle of the Indian ocean a 
column of marble bears this plaintive tale — and bears the 
name of Harriet Newell. 

A traveller on his horse was toiling beneath the sun 
of Georgia. He had overpassed the sands. The broken 
hills, the forests, the rude wigwam, the dark scowls of 
Indian suspicion rose on his view, like the phantasms of 
a hideous dream. He meekly spoke to those who had 
rarely known tlie white man, save in battle or treachery — 
he spoke to them tenderly of Jesus — he told them how 
his Saviour and their Saviour had died for them, and 
how, like his Saviour, he was willing to lay down his 



29 

life for them if they would only love his Lord. Surprised 
and overpowered to tears by such language from a white 
man, the unbending sternness of the savage character 
began to soften into the mellowness and glow of christian 
love. This traveller loved these benighted Indians unto 
death. He laid himself down on their blanket — and they 
saw, with broken and adoring hearts, how a good man — 
a lamented missionary could die. 



THE SACRAMENTAL FEAST. 

I eat the white memorial bread, 

I drink the Sacramental cup — 
My thoughts the passion mountain tread 

Where Jesus gave his spirit up. 

'Twas night — the doves of dewy heaven 
With drooping, evening wings at rest, — 

Brief calm before the tempest given, — 
Were rustling in their downy nest. 

Then came in shadows, gloom and fear. 

In blood, in tearfulness, in death, 
The traitor— cross— the gory spear — 

The sigh— the groan — the parting breath. 

But — onward — o'er the crimson hill, 
Ripe harvests of the earth are spread — 

Bright crowns ofUfe the vision fill, 
For Jesus sleeps not with the dead. 

3 



30 
RELIGION OF ANCIENT MEXICO. 

The attention of the world has been so frequently 
dii'ected to the idolatrous systems of India, that the 
stupendous structure of Mexican idolatry, as it existed 
at the time of the Spanish invasion, is rarely mentioned, 
and scarcely retains any hold on the memory of man. 
The sources from which we compile the following brief 
historical sketch, are the Letter from Cortez to the King 
of Spain on the conquest of Mexico, and the History of 
Bernal Diaz, an eye-witness of what he describes. 

At the time of the invasion, Mexico, at the very 
summit of earthly prosperity, sustained her tenth king, 
Montezuma — a monarch inheriting many noble qualities 
of mind and gentleness of disposition united to warlike 
energies. The form of government was monarchical, 
but not hereditary, and the police of the empire was a 
most skilful and politic combination of well-balanced 
powers and checks, producing the firmest consolidation 
of interests. Indeed, the reflecting mind can scarcely 
reconcile the horrid cruelty of their bloody religion with 
the hai*mony, and, in many respects, equitable frame of 
their government. Architectural grandeur, and the 
towers of temple, fortress, palace and tomb, gave ancient 
Mexico, seated in the midst of her quiet lake, the 
appearance which may be supposed to have belonged to 
Tyre, once the queen of cities, as she smiled in beautiful 
sublimity over the blue waters of the Mediterranean. 
Well might the Spaniards pause in wonder as their 
column of battle, like a cloud slumbering a moment on 



31 

the brow of the stupendous mountain environs, came in 
full view of this magnificent city. The market sent out 
the roar of business to the hills louder than that of 
Constantinople or of the Eternal city — and the unlooked 
for, and, as yet, undescribed grandeur of the palaces and 
temples was calculated to make the deepest impression 
on a foreign mind. 

The chief temple of their religion occupied as much 
ground as a town capable of sustaining five hundred 
inhabitants. It was, indeed, garrisoned by ten thousand 
men, the body guard of the sovereign. Surrounded by 
high walls, with four massive gates, it threw up to a great 
altitude more than twenty towers or pyramids, each one 
surmounted by an idol. At a little distance from this 
temple stood a tower, a true emblem of hell, its vast door 
resembling the opened mouth of an enormous monster, 
filled with demon and serpent forms of terrible size. It 
was a place of human sacrifice, covered continually with 
blood. 

In the larger temple were two altars highly adorned, 
and over them the gigantic figures of their war god, 
Huitzilopuchtli, and his brother, Tezcalepuca, the god 
of the infernal regions. The first had a great face, 
terrible eyes, was covered with gold and jewels, had a 
necklace of gold and silver wrought into the figures of 
human heads and hearts ornamented with precious stones 
of a blue color, and his huge body was bound with 
golden serpents ; the other had the countenance of a bear 
with great shining eyes, and an equal profusion of gold 
and jewels wrought into, if possible, a more diabolic 
assemblage of infernal imagery. Before the first of these 



32 

shapes, lay three human hearts, v/et with blood — before 
the latter, four — taken from the victims while alive, by 
making a sudden incision in the side, tearing out the 
heart, and casting it before the idol, while the eyes of 
the victim were rolling in the death agony, and the 
limbs quivering in the mortal pang. These sacrifices 
were so frequently repeated, that the stench from the 
shedding of blood and its consequent putrefaction, was 
almost intolerable. In this place was a drum of enormous 
size, the head of which was composed of the skins of 
large serpents, making a noise when struck that might be 
heard at the distance of two leagues ; and, says Bernal 
Diaz, so doleful, that it deserved to be named the music 
of the infernal regions. The bodies of all their idols far 
exceeded the human form in size, and were composed 
of a mixture of pulse and grain, formed into a paste with 
human blood. Their priests w^ere numerous, — imposed 
upon themselves the vow of continence, permitted no 
female to enter their dwellings, wore their hair in thick 
clotted masses, and lacerated their ears in honor of their 
gods. The children of the caciques were educated by 
them, and their testimony respecting each pupil decided 
whether his name should be inscribed on the list of nobles 
or plebians. Personal merit alone formed the distinction 
of the nobility. 

This brief outline only presents a single view of the 
stupendous fabric of idol worship reared in the ancient 
city of Mexico. The idolatry of India may cover a wider 
field — but it has not so deep a tinge of blood as that 
which shone on the cruel altars of the descendants of the 
Aztecs. 



ALGIERS — A SONNET. 

The Gallic standards climb thy height, 

Thou city of the Pirate horde ; 
Red flames are on thy bastions bright, 

The fiery besom of the Lord — 

For groans are in thy horiid cells ; 

The anguish of a thousand years 
Comes rolling with the battle yells 

O'er pavements wet with bloody tears. 

'Tis dreadful on thy crescent hills to gaze. 
While the Archangel's vials pour 

The wild, retributory blaze 
On mount and tower and shore ; 

How terribly the heavens frown 

When blood has brought their thunder down ! 



A PLEA FOR AFRICA, 

Delivered July 4th, 1830, in Bennet street Church, Boston — in behalf of 
the American Colonization Society. 

Ethiopia shall stretch out her hands unto God — Psalm Ixviii. 31. 

The rise and fall of nations are sublime subjects for 
moral contemplation. The fabric of empire is composed 
of mind as well as matter ; and when the revolutions of 
destiny are permitted by Providence to encroach on 
nations, and resolve them into their original elements, the 
component parts still inherit the principles of vitality. — 

3* 



34 

Like those blocks of living marble dug up from Grecian 
ruins, these scattered fragments may be collected in some 
future day to build a nobler temple of dominion. 

History warns the powerful to tread lightly on the 
oppressed. Let armies as coundess as the locusts which 
overspread Egypt in the day of God's anger, pass over 
any given territory, tracing their march widi the wildest 
havoc, and sweeping the bare soil to its very dust with 
the desolating cannon — still let not the oppressors triumph. 
In some secret cavern of the earth — in some untravelled 
glen — in some sunless gorge, a few miserable beings may 
shelter themselves until the blast of war has overblown. 
These may be the fathers of a great people, whose first 
work, in the great drama of Providence, may be that of 
a bloody retribution. 

'Let not the oppressor triumph' — says a great voice 
from heaven. God abhors the proud. The sighing of the 
prisoner comes up before him. The robe of sackcloth is 
as beautiful in his eyes as the gorgeous attire of palaces 
— and the human form, furrowed with the task-master's 
whip, is as acceptable to its Maker, as the pampered and 
delicately beautiful countenance of him whom the winds 
of heaven have not been permitted to visit too roughly. 

The analogies of all conquered nations warrant these 
introductory remarks. The conquered have in their turn 
become the conquerors — the slaves have become the 
masters — the harp hung on the drooping willows has lost 
its moaning sound, and in the renovated hand of its 
possessor has poured out the martial song of the triumph- 
ing trumpet. What sight more deeply affecting to the 



35 

sympathies of humanity could have been witnessed than 
those spectacles of earth's deepest sorrow so often seen 
in the luxuriant vales of Palestine, when God had given 
up his chosen people into the hands of their enemies ? 
The sacked and smoking streets of the dear Jerusalem — 
ohj could they remain there ! would afford the miserable 
some mementoes of former happiness. The eye red 
with weeping might rest on some of the mighty stones of 
the first temple, or on some lonely monument crowned 
with a name dear to Judah, strong and immortal in death. 
But no ! away over hill and valley, over brook and 
meadow — away over mountain and river these exiles, 
forlorn and weary and broken hearted, must go, while 
over them hangs the strong probability, if not certainty, 
that the beautiful places that had once known them should 
know them no more. Prophet and king, prince and 
counsellor, the care-worn man of war and the drooping 
virgin, chained together in ranks, with feeble age and 
infancy along, darkened thy hills, Judea, more than once 
with their mournful procession, formed under the eye, 
and urged along by the spear of the Assyrian. INo song 
is heard among these thousands ; the inconceivable weight 
of national sorrow stifles and hushes the very groan — 
tears only, sad and hopeless ones, fall in silent showers 
on a soil soon destined to become sand under the blast 
of desert winds. Far north — to the cold waters of 
Babylon — go sit you down and mourn — ^yet not in quiet- 
ness ; the task-master's scourge shall resound in your 
ears ; heavy burdens shall press you down ; your deli- 
cately formed young men shall stand as menials in the 



36 

courts of strange monarchs — and they that carry you 
away captive shall require of you mirth, saying. Sing us 
one of the songs of Zion. 

This picture of deep and immense national sorrow is 
one of truth — a retrospective one, copied from the pages 
of God's word. Yet a land so swept by the tempest of 
war, and so emptied of its'dwellers, has, after a lapse of 
years, a solitary succession of winter and spring and 
summer and autumn, voiceless, desolate and dreary, 
heard again a turtle-dove raise its sweet melancholy voice, 
and next an old man, who could just remember the day 
of the spoiler when he was a little boy, with tottering 
step, after a captivity of seventy years, traces with his 
staff the outline of city, temple and tomb, and calls upon 
the Lord God of Israel until the old echoes awake again 
in the hoary mountains, and beat against the brazen hea- 
vens. Then comes a virgin along the valley, and as she 
lifts her song and takes her timbrel, the spring breathes 
over the land ; the verdure breaks forth ; the rose blushes 
beneath the rock ; Kedron murmurs once more over its 
shining pebbles ; the valley of Jehoshophat is burdened 
with unwonted exuberance ; Bethlehem seems lo smile 
above the ramparts of white rocks, and Jerusalem gathers 
around her stately form the clouds of power, while the 
crown of dominion begins to settle on her brow. 

After these views, I introduce the doctrine of my text, 
which is : — That while no nation can he reduced so low, 
without entire extermination, as not to leave the hope of a 
future renovation, every nation must infallibly rise in 
power and glory, to whom the mighty promise of God 
hath extended. 



37 

It was the promise of Jehovah that brought his poor 
afflicted people from Egypt, where they had suffered the 
terrible evils of slavery. It was his promise that led the 
wanderers through a dry and thirsty land, and made their 
armies, when they at length invaded the land of Canaan, 
like the unbound waves of the great sea, dreadful in 
their overflowing strength. A supernatural power walks 
abroad through that host where God's banner, all unseen 
to the faithless eye of the multitude, floats heavily and 
broadly before the undimmed eye of faith and heavenly 
confidence. — 'In this sign, I conquer,^ said Constantlne, 
v^hen a fiery cross was suspended In heaven — and thus, 
when the Christian finds the promise of God pledged to 
the fulfilment of any event, he places all his confidence 
there and acts as though the event had passed and become 
one of the records of history, or was even then passing 
before his eyes in the full tide of its accomplishment. 
Faith has a power unknown to earth ; it rends the 
heavens, and takes fast hold of uncreated strength ; it 
uncovers the hiding place of futurity, and knows some- 
thing of those great dispensations which are meted out 
in the strong promises and threatenings of the Holy One 
of Israel. When God has threatened, in years gone by, 
to exterminate any nation and blot the last trace of their 
lineage from the face of the earth, the christian is not 
seen, like the incredulous Scavant of modern times, 
raking in the dust of Tyre and Sidon, sacking the hollow 
and tenantless tombs to find one descendant of perished 
empire, to mock the promise and impeach the threatening 
of * Him who cannot lie.' Where God has spoken his 



38 

sweeping judgments against a nation, none need expect 
to find a drop of patrial blood in the veins of any one 
on the bosom of the earth. The explorer of long perished 
empires, in his frail boat on those purple waters where 
Tyre once sat down the * Queen of Nations,' may look 
into the deep and find its bottom paved with broken 
columns, the carved and lustred marble of her day of 
pride ; but let him ask the wandering Arab, or the fierce 
Bedouin, or the solitary fisherman who dries his net upon 
the wave-worn rocks, if they can trace their descent to 
a city which centuries ago frowned above these tossing 
waves in the sublimity of power — they shall shake their 
heads in astonishment, and answer — no. For their des- 
cent they will point far eastward to the desert. They 
know not the name of those sea-washed ruins, and have 
no tradition of departed empire to chant in hollow 
cadence to the beating of wild billows. 

The promise and the threatening of Heaven are alike 
certain in their fulfilment. Where now are the proud 
millions of Babylon ? Where her Kings — her hundreds 
of provinces — her brazen gates. — her lofty towers, and 
golden palaces ? They are no where to be found. Wind 
and water, war and earthquake have raged against the 
very earth on which its corner-stone was planted, until 
darkness and doubt brood over the bleak and desolate 
site. Perhaps this wonder of the world stood here, where 
the reedy, sinuous Tigris steals along through a plain of 
boundless prospect — or perhaps the spot is indicated 
yonder by mounds of enormous bricks — or still farther 
GO, where shaggy furze and stinted shrubbery hide from 



39 

human eye the den of the dragon, and the retreat of the 
desert serpent. There is no descendant of Babylonian 
kings, of whom we may ask where the temple of Belus 
stood, or the awful city lifted up its batdements. Yet of 
a poor, peeled, despised nation, who once were slaves to 
Babylon the Great, hundreds of thousands now may be 
found scattered over the provinces of the earth. With 
them lives the remembrance of ancient days, and the 
loved name of their own Jerusalem. Preserved by the 
promise, and obliterated by the threatening of Heaven's 
Majesty, I hold these two nations up before you, as 
spectacles of solemn import. The one indeed, is the 
shadowy, unsubstantial, ghostlike form of a deceased 
empire, slain by the curse of the Almighty ; the other 
although scarred by the descending lightning, bleached 
by the bitter north winds, or scorched by the Siroc of 
the desert, is still a mighty form, through which a warm 
life-blood gushes, and to whom, eternal blessings that 
shall blend earth and heaven in a measureless flood of 
glory, are about to come through the fulfilling promises. 
I have lingered enough in the ancient world to fix the 
great truth in the minds of this respected audience, of 
God's faithfulness in the fulfilment of his national promises 
and national threatenings. The day — the high occasion 
— the voice of liberty, echoing from the thousand hills 
of this favored land — and, alas ! the groans of millions, 
heard low and smothered, like the first meanings of an 
earthquake, call me to the momentous considerations of 
our own times. I come weeping and deprecating the 
wrath of Him, who goeth forth, at times, through the 



40 

earth, making inquest for blood, and terribly shaking the 
guilty nations. Spare, Lord, in thy hot displeasure. Let 
the dark wing of vengeance linger awhile in the already 
gathered cloud. Let the red sword rest longer still in its 
scabbard. Frown not upon this chosen people — for thy 
frown is death — extermination. Thy loving kindness is 
better than life ! 

Over against the southern part of our continent, divided 
from Europe by the Mediterranean sea, another continent 
stretches along, holding us in equipoise, like a weight in 
the opposite scale of the balance. This should be called 
the monumental continent, as it is a land whose every 
promontory, and every speaking, murmuring river testify 
of wrong, of outraged humanity, of nature bleeding in 
immense agony through millions of palpitating pores, and 
staining every land and discoloring every sea with gory 
blood. What hath Africa done, that her children should 
blacken beneath a heavier, more lasting curse, than ever 
rested on any other nation ! What hath she done to thee, 
great America, that thou boldest her sons, her daughters, 
her feeble infants in bondage, and refusestto let them go ? 
' Carthage must he destroyed,^ was the Roman motto, 
when her Scipios drove the legions of Hannibal from 
the vine-covered hills of Italy, back again to Africa — 
but the motto of the christian world against every son 
and daughter of Africa, has breathed a fiercer and less 
tender spirit. To erase from being, is to inflict but a 
momentary pang — v/hile to enslave generation after 
generation, from the earliest dawn of hfe's clouded day, 
to its dark going down, is to entail torture in such a fearful 



41. 

shape, as to make it bear no imaginary similitude to 
everlasting wo ! Oh ! could we this day assemble the 
enslaved sons of Africa ! — bring forward the millions free 
America holds in bondage, alike regardless of human or 
divine right — make the Indian islands give up their slaves, 
and Southern America yield her's — place them where the 
cool winds of heaven might fan their throbbing foreheads 
in the amphitheatre of your broadest valley ; for their 
numbers would throng a wide extent of territory — and 
there, speak peace to all their troubles ! We would 
tenderly say — bleeding Africans ! Your God remembers 
you. He did not account of you as dust trodden down 
to be carried away by every passing wind. He did not 
leave you without a promise. The mighty pulsations of 
joy could not be full in the mind of uncreated benevolence 
until, in the deep communions of His spirit with man, 
He had revealed Africa stretching forth her hands — her 
hands — for alas ! she hath worn manacles, and could not 
lift up her iron-eaten sinews to the avenger of nations ! 
Oh, Africa! this is the broad charter of thy coming 
freedom — the promise of the everlasting God. When 
human charters, that have attracted the admiration of the 
nations, shall cease to convey freedom in their tenure, 
thy charter shall be found fresh and undisputed in that 
book, so magnificently described by Pollock in his 
* Course of Time,' as being the 

* Most wondrous book ! bright candle of the Lord ! 
Star of eternity ! the only star 
By which the bark of man could navigate 
The sea of life, and gain the coast of bliss 
4 



42 

Securely ; — only star which rose on time, 

And, on its dark and troubled billows, still, 

As genei'ation drifting swiftly by. 

Succeeded generation, threw a ray 

Of Heaven's own light, and to the hills of God, 

The everlasting hills, pointed the sinner's eye.' 

The quenchless fire of the Ethiopian eye, the tireles;^ 
vigor of the African frame, the ardent temperament of 
nature, the maturity of the affections in that fervid clime 
— all, all forbid, equally with the glorious promise of the 
Maker of all worlds, that Africa should be lost — should 
ring no paean to the praise of Almighty goodness, when 
the harmony of the redeemed nations goes up from earth 
to heaven. Who will dare chain a noble, a king, to whom 
empires are hastening to do homage ? Yet, oh Africa, 
this nation of freedom have enslaved thy children and 
thy kings ! 

The day is past, when any attempt may be expected 
to vindicate slavery on philosophical or religious princi- 
ples. It is a horrible wrong, unjustifiable, impeached 
by every noble feeling that throbs in the bosoms of the 
collective race of humanity. Is it possible that the con- 
stituted authorities of a nation so highly favored as this — 
so exalted to heaven in point of privilege — should feel a 
single doubt as to a proper and most imperious object 
for the appropriation of national revenue, when the 
overflowing ^ treasury of the nation should demand a 
legislation for the appropriation of such super-abundance ! 
The war-ships of our heaven-delivered land — our eagle 
banner of victory — the one to convey to their native 



43 

shores, and the other to wave over and shelter the long 
exiled sons of Ethiopia, would present the noblest image 
of moral grandeur that ever reflected on the glassy 
bosom of the great deep. After the national debt shall 
have been discharged, it will not be beyond ihe resources 
of America to relieve and return one fourth of a million 
of slaves annually, with safety to themselves, and most 
especially glorious to the country that shall institute such 
operations, to repair the measureless extent of wrong 
that has been inflicted, for generations, almost by the 
common consent of man, on an unoffending people. 

I need not here repeat what has already been effected 
by the American Colonization Society. The transactions 
of this institution are known to all. They are so full of 
benevolence and the hallowed impulses of Heaven's 
own mercy, that one might, with the propriety of truth, 
compare its radiant influences to a rainbow, insufferably 
bright, spanning the sombre clouds of human wrong, that 
have accumulated on the horizon of our country's 
prosperity, and beating back, with calm and heavenly 
power, the blackening storm that always threatens, in 
growling thunders, a heavy retribution. 

' One of the earliest acts of this society was to des- 
patch a competent agent to Africa, to explore its coasts 
and the countries bordering upon them, and to select a 
suitable spot for the establishment of the contemplated 
colony. The society was eminently fortunate in the 
choice of its agent, as it has been, generally, in those 
whom it subsequently engaged in its service. A selection 
was finally made of a proper district of country, a 



44 

purchase was effected of it from the native autliorities, 
to which additions have been made, as the growing wants 
of the colony, actual or anticipated, required. The 
country so acquired, embraces a large track of fertile 
land, capable of yielding all the rich and varied products 
of the tropics, possesses great commercial advantages, 
with an extent of sea-coast from 150 to 200 miles, and 
enjoys a salubrious climate, well adapted to the African 
constitution, and not so fatal to the whites as many sickly 
parts of the United States. 

* Within that district of country, the society founded 
its colony, under the denomination of Liberia, established 
towns, laid off plantations for the colonists, and erected 
military works for theii; defence. Annually, and as often 
as the pecuniary circumstances of the society would admit, 
vessels from the ports of the United States have been 
sent to Liberia, laden with emigrants, with utensils, 
provisions, and other objects, for their comfort. No diffi- 
culty has been experienced in obtaining as many colonists 
as the means of the society were competent to transport. 
They have been found, indeed, altogether inadequate to 
accomodate all who were willing and anxious to go. 

^ The colony contains, at this time, about sixteen hun- 
dred inhabitants, emigrants from the United States ; the 
colonists become acclimated and healthy — have erected 
comfortable houses for themselves and families, and 
necessary public edifices, and are pursuing diligently and 
thriftily their private vocations, cultivating farms, following 
mechanical trades, or engaging in commerce with the 
natives of the interior and along the coast. As a 



45 

community, It has acquired and maintains a character and 
influence with the tribes or nations around it ; preserves 
order and quiet within ; protects each in his rights of 
person and of property ; has its courts, its militia, schools 
for the children of the colonists and of the natives, a 
printing press, a newspaper, public hbrary, churches, and 
frequent and periodical performances of divine service — 
in short, it presents, in a land of ignorance and depravity, 
of Paganism and Mahommedanism, the interesting and 
bright exhibition of an intelligent, moral, and christian 
community.' 

It must be seen in this review, hasty, indeed, and 
inadequate to the magnitude of the subject, that although 
wonders have been accomplished by the Society, its 
efforts notwithstanding are not sufficiently powerful to 
diminish the evil to any great extent. The society is 
worthy of all praise, as it embodies nearly all the energetic 
feeling that exists in our nation on the subject of slavery. 
But the Herculean task is imposed on the wrong should- 
ers. Take it from those of spontaneous benevolence and 
philanthropy, and place it on those of power and national 
resources, and the feeble wrestlings of an infant with the 
monster slavery, would give place to the secure and 
effectual operations of full-grown manhood. It may be 
assumed as an undeniable position, that the expenditures 
of ransoming and establishing the two millions of slave 
population on their native continent, would be less than 
the expenditures of a war that should have for its object 
the extermination of two millions of human byeings. It 
costs less to save than to destrov. 
4* 



46 

Christian America ! I rausl, reluctantly, close m)" 
plea in behalf of enslaved millions, by charging home 
upon the capitol where the emblematic eagle spreads his 
broadest, boldest wing — upon every legislative hall in the 
slave-holding states — upon magistrate and people — upon 
army and navy — upon plain, mountain and river, the deep, 
and, as yet, irreversible stain of slavery. The Genius 
of Columbia, as she surveys from the loftiest peak of 
the Alleghanies, the azure field where the stars are 
sprinkled, has also in prospect the nebulous vapors that 
roll up heavily from the slave-cultured earth. The eye 
of HEAVEN is brighter than her's of the * stripes and 
stars' — and Heaven is all ear to record every extorted 
groan. The solemn demand in the high chancery of 
heaven against the beloved country of my adoption and 
tenderest love, will not be the price of what Africa now 
is — but of what she would have been, if her millions who 
have miserably perished in inhospitable climes, like 
branches rent from the parent tree, had remained on 
the shores of her Gambia, her Niger, and had from 
the genial influences of peaceful commerce, and the 
renovations of civilization, surpassed the grandeur of her 
once renowned empires. It is the ghost of a mighty 
people that points the fleshless hand towards America : 
then, solemnly raising it towards heaven, says, ^ I mill 
meet tJiee there* — not at Philippi, in night and battle 
agony, but at^the bar of God, under the blaze of the 
judgment fires, just when the highest hills in heaven are 
reddened with the united flames of Africa and America. 
1 will meet thee there to usk for my kings and queens, 



47 

my sons and daughters, my cities, my national renown — 
and for my eternal salvation ! 

Slowly, like one stiffened in death, the accusing spectre 
has vanished. It is for us my beloved countrymen — it is 
for us to lay this terrible spirit forever, that he accuse us 
not at a moment when all that have breathed on earth — 
* the world's gray fathers' and the latest born, shall be 
witnesses of our disgrace — when the hollowness of our 
boast of freedom shall provoke ' the jeers of the world.' 



GOD. 

Skies dark with azure glory see, 
Above which swim the ships of heaven ; 

They all belong, oh God, to thee, 

And by thy breath their sails are driven. 

Clouds spread like thunder-thrones abroad — 
Wind — flame — and night — and curling ware 

All speak the Everpresent God, 
Strong to destroy, but swift to save. 

Wide ocean, hush thy beating breast. 

Emblem of vast Eternity ! 
God's voice hath calmed thy waves to rest, 

And hemmed with sand thy drapeiy. 

Beautiful earth, crowned with wild flowers. 

With honey-suckles redolent. 
His voice with music fills thy bowers, 

And thy fair liills with merriment. 



48 
SUMMER. 

It is a recent remark that the United States are 
scorched with the summer of" Syria and frozen with the 
winter of Russia. The consequence of these extremes 
is that our scenery has a character distinct from other 
continents. The glowing' sun would ripen the rich fruits 
of the tropics if the winter did not abridge the period 
necessary for ripening them — but even our severe winters 
if they destroy fruit and flower, have no injurious power 
over foliage. The American forest is made up so much 
of the evergreen that the snow and frost destroy only 
half of the mountain beauty ; an imperturbable green, 
more beautiful on account of the white back ground, 
smiles all winter long above the deep snow. 

The excess of foliage, if it may be so called, marks 
the strength of our soil and the exuberance of our 
climate. The American mountains, with but few 
exceptions, are wooded to their very summits, and 
waters, purer and sweeter than the fabled Olympian 
nectar, gush down their sides and irrigate the evergreen 
forests. The great changes discernable in the course of 
the year, throughout a wide extent of our country, are 
a refreshing of the deep standing color of the evergreens 
in the months of April and May. The hills and mountains 
throw out a livelier tint — the table lands and the vallies 
are covered over with a mellowed, fawn-colored foliage, 
intermingled with snowy white where the flowers precede 
or overpower the leaves — the chasms between the 
districts of unchanging verdure are filled up with the 
softer shades that are doomed to an existence measured 
by summer suns and winds. 



49 

This is the first great change. The second is after the 
frosts have passed upon shrub and leaf and flower ; 
given to some a brown color, to others a fiery red, and 
the rains and winds have wept and moaned over the 
autumnal quietus of the leafy groves. 

Between the birth and death of flowers and foliage 
the American summer reigns with unrivalled glory. The 
intense heat is generally so well balanced with rain and 
dew that the sun rarely scorches the verdure, except in 
seasons remarkable for drought. 

The interchange of rain and sunshine is worthy of 
note. The mercury in the thermometer may range 
during the day above ninety — thunder gusts of brief 
duration may drench the earth one hour to be absorbed 
by the unveiled rays of the next hour — and the general 
equation of the heat be sustained throughout the day 
until sober evening has cooled the atmosphere and 
thrown the creeping vapors along the margins of rivers 
and brooks. 

The summer moons are glorious. From the remark- 
able elevation of the visible concave they pour their 
enchanting light into the bosom of the greeen woods 
the embrasures of the hills, and abroad over the tranquil 
surfaces of lakes and streamlets. The atmosphere is 
not stained and consequently contracted by colored 
vapors — all is transparent — the skies are blue above, 
and the stainless moonbeams diffuse their silver radiance 
over the face of nature, softening the wildness and 
beautifying the sublimity of our magnificent scenery. 



50 

SATURDAY EVENING. 

Down rolls the sun — and man may rest, 
For Sabbath bells will chime to-morrow, 

And holy hymns, to God addressed, 
Shall chase away the bosom's sorrow. 

Come, poor man, come and rest thee now, 
Thy week of toil for bread is o'er — 

Come, wipe in peace thy care worn brow. 
For God hath heard thy prayer once more. 

Again the channel of thy wealth 
In blushing torrents shall roll by — 

Nor more by shipwreck, flame and stealth, 
Shalt thou be clothed with poverty. 

Come, rich man, stop the thousand wheels 

That roar in labor night and day. 
And, as thy soul in silence kneels, 

Come, learn the words thy heart should pray 

To God in heaven, 

The only King 

Of kings serene. 
How shall I give as he hath given — 
How suffer like his suflfering 
My guilty soul to screen ! 

Oh could I love 
As he hath done 
Through death's cold night ; 
And then, when morning smiled above 
The ice-cold sepulchre of stone. 
Still love with |)ity and delight ! 



51 

Let me forgive 

My enemy, 

And let me sigh, 
O'er sins that in my memory live, 
And just and faithful let me be 
Till I have found my home on high. 

'Tis Saturday evening — and lonely in heaven 
The moon like a pearl to the earth is given, 
Deep notes of joy on the soft winds are thrown, 
And nature, this night, smiles for man alone. 



GEORGE THE IV. — king of England. 

We have words of eulogy for a king no more than 
for another man. In our estimation all men are equal — 
excepting always the equality of those miserable beings 
who flutter in the sunshine of courts and live in the 
smile of princes. 

George the Fourth was born in the palace of St. 
James, August 12, 1762, and lived to be far advanced in 
his 68th year. Until he was thirty years of age his 
person was considered a model of manly beauty — and 
every grace of form was armed by his facinating and 
seductive manners, investing him with a dangerous power 
over the female heart which he seemed not disposed to 
exert on the side of virtue. After the age of thirty, 
other ravages than those of time began to develope in 
his constitution, and his body exhibited a strong inclina- 



52 

tion to an unwieldly, unnatural corpulency, attended with 
gout and inflammatory symptoms. It is rather a matter 
of wonder that he lived so long, than of surprise at the 
occurence of his death in his sixty-eighth year. 

The political career of this king may be summed up 
in a few words. In the early part of his life, he, as prince 
of Wales, headed the opposition, or the whig party — and 
thus arrayed, with Fox, Burke, Windham, Spencer, 
Fitzwilliam, and others, opposed the administration of 
his father, George III. At the commencement of the 
French revolution, he deserted the party whose creed 
hardly recognized the divine right or the legitimacy of 
kings. After this he made no stir on the political arena 
until the year 1810, when his father's insanity made the 
prince in every thing but name a king. 

It would be an act of injustice to the English nation 
and an impeachment of the wisdom of British ministers 
to give the king the credit of the vast, complicated and 
successful operations that may have been brought to a 
successful termination during his reign. In a government 
sO admirably balanced in the distribution of power as the 
English, the chief of the nation, may be entitled to credit 
for two things — for a judicious choice of ministry, and 
for not opposing them when once in place. George the 
Fourth is entitled to credit on account of both of the 
above named considerations. 

During the jeign of George the Third, England was 
a loser in the game of nations ; during the reign of 
George the Fourth she has triumphed often in arms, 
oftener in policy — has been the centre and rallying point 



/ 



53 

of that stern vengeance which fell upon the legions of 
Napoleon at Waterloo — has gathered laurels with a 
prodigal hand — has added immensely to a national debt 
almost beyond the reach of numeration before — and has 
gained — not an inch of territory. 

We will simply allude to two transactions that may 
appear in a dubious light on the pages of history — one 
the relentless persecution of Queen Caroline ; the other, 
the imprisonment of Napoleon. It is not for us to express 
an opinion on either of these topics. We speak of them 
as of those things already under a bitter censure from 
large portions oi that conmiunity whose united or preva- 
lent opinion makes up the decisions of history. 

With regard to the christian character of his late 
majesty but little can be said — It is, however, a 
remarkable fact that the Bishop of Winchester, who was 
his spiritual adviser, received his honors on account of 
his faithful, uncompromising plainness and fidelity to the 
King of kings. ' Sumner,' said the king one day to 
Winchester before his episcopal advancement, 'you make 
me tremble in view of my responsibility to God.' 

He was observant of the sacred rites of religion in 
his last hours, and received the sacrament after his 
physicians had communicated to him their belief of his 
approaching dissolution. Like most men who have lived 
pleasurable lives, the king, during his sickness, shuddered 
at the thought of the pains of death — and saw nothing 
fearful in dissolution, excepting -the attending agonies. 
His dying words were most eloquent. Nature then spoke 

her own language. 
6 



54 

It was a king on his death bed — one who had filled 
the cup of worldly grandeur to the brim. Power was 
inapotency then. Habits of command were of no avail 
in the conflict then raging. Desiring his attendants to 
change the "position of his head, he suddenly motioned 
them to desist, and putting his hand on his breast, said — 
Oh this is not right ! This is death 1 Oh, God, I am 
dying. The mind often goes out into the dark, explorins:; 
to find out, if possible, what may be the nature of those 
untried sensations which precede and attend the struggle 
of dissolution. Here we find all that we can know until 
we make the experiment for ourselves and for none else. 
The sensation which was immediately consequent on the 
rupture of a blood vessel, is recognized by the king. It 
was a new, untried one — it was death. — One exclamation 
to his maker closes a monarch's volume of spoken things, 
— and even this exclamation breathes nothing of hope. 
It carries terror, surprise, if not despair, in its impotent 
cry. What a lesson for the great ! George the Fourth 
has gone where he is not known as a monarch — but as a 
man. 



RELIGION. 



This word connects two worlds together. It embraces 
every thing pure, holy, blessed, peaceful, in this world, 
and carries forward the immortal mind in rapturous 
anticipation to the full fruition of eternity. Religion is 



55 

not profession, so much as possession ; it is not creed, so 

much as deed. It is that which honors God and blesses 

man. Madmen have quarrelled about religion, soldiers 

have fought about it, and countries have been depopulated 

on its account, while it has been far away from all these 

scenes of strife, and no more responsible for the fires of 

persecution or the destruction of battle than the sleeping 

infant. Religion is peace — and all opposition to it is war. 

It comes and softens the heart of the sinner, renders the 

glorious Jesus visible to the mind's eye, checks and 

finally subdues the current of moral wickedness, and 

prepares the temper for the concord of heaven, where 

no voice of contention shall ever be heard, and no 

jarring sectarisms dispute the territory. Religion is a 

principle of life, or it could not breathe amidst the 

pollutions of our moral death. Sustained by the mighty 

spirit of God, rendered efficacious by the pangs and 

blood of an Infinite Sacrifice, it comes upon mankind 

like a conqueror — but it conquers by love — it hushes the 

tumults of the soul — makes peace between the creature 

and the Creator — and signs, even here upon earth, the 

preliminaries of future inheritance. Not to be purchased 

by oceans of tears, the tears of penitence must flow before 

religion comes into the soul to abide there. Not to be 

bought by duties, hard and laborious, the duties required 

by God must cheerfully and spontaneously be fulfilled 

before the sanctifier takes up his abode with the servant, 

who shall one day, if persevering, become a son. Earth 

has no moral sun, but the sun of religion — heaven has 

no other light and needs no other to throw insufferable 

effulgence throughout all its glorious scenery. 



56 
RELIGION AND POETRY, 

The connection between religious emotion and poetic 
enthusiasm is a subject worthy of more than a transient 
reflection. The sensibilities and emotions connected 
with religion have perhaps less of fervency than the ardor 
of poetry — but they have an energy, a power to mould, 
transform and sustain beyond any earth-born feeling. 
Religion, in its moments of triumph, calls in the aid of 
poetry to sustain with its ministry the wing of devotion 
rising towards its native heaven. In seasons of religious 
despondency, too, the harp is taught to moan with 
melancholy music. Plaintive thoughts, — the remem- 
brances that come over the mind of the captive, — the 
bright anticipations of faith, spontaneously clothe them- 
selves in poetic drapery — and, from this circumstance, 
a very common error has originated; which is, that 
religious emotion is nothing more than the action of the 
mind under a high state of excitement. 

The advocate for the individuality and the supernatural 
origin of religion has a marked advantage over the 
champion for the excitements of genius, taste, passion 
or sublimity, derived from the last scenes of life, when 
time gives up the being of a few years to the unchanging 
dominion of eternity. It is but seldom that a man of 
genius retains in the hour of death the enthusiasm which 
distinguished his life. A man of genius may indeed have 
the nobler enthusiasm of religion to sustain him when 
earthly objects cease to interest him — ^but, to a very 
general extent, men feel at death the impotency of fame, 
riches, power or human grandeur in any of its varieties. 



57 

and reach out their imploring hands towards the mighty 
spirit whose influence is supposed to extend beyond the 
boundaries of this world and control the destines of the 
future. 

It is just to consider poetry as the servant of religion, 
bending its vivid perceptions of beauty and the melody 
of its song to the service of a better one than itself. 
Miriam, on the farther shore of the Red Sea, could not 
praise the author of her country's deliverance without 
calling to her aid the triumphant measures of the Hebrew 
verse — and, throughout the volume of inspiration, the 
higher emotions of dtvotional triumph are poured forth 
by different writers through the language of impassioned 
song. An analysis of the pleasurable sensations created 
in the cultivated mind by poetic imagery will at once 
detect the difference between religion and poetry. — 
Montgomery, who is an excellent authority on both 
subjects, spurns the idea advanced by Dr. Johnson, in 
his life of Waller, and subsequently in his life of Watts, 
that sacred subjects are unfit for poetry, nay, incapable 
of being combined with it. He considers the native 
majesty and grace of religious emotions far above the 
reach of human embellishment, yet would advocate the 
propriety of pressing into the service of religion the 
noblest powers of men — and remarks that a poet of 
christian character can find no more difficulty in blending 
beauty, simplicity, and sublimity with heavenly aspirations, 
than in combining the same qualities of song with the 
dreamy flights of fancy or the pictorial descriptions of 
nature and the human passions. 



5S 

Montgomery has given examples from authors of the 
last generation of pure simplicity and pathetic expression 
which would have been most admirably suited to sacred 
themes. We give two of his quotations in his own 
language : — 

* See the wretch, that long has tost 

On the thorny bed of pam, 
At length repair his vigor lost, 

And breathe and walk again : 
The meanest floweret of the vale. 
The simple note that swells the gale, 
The common sun, the air, the skies. 
To him are opening paradise.' 

Grmfs Fragment on Vicissitude. 

It cannot be questioned that this is genuine poetry ; 
and the beautiful, but not obvious thought, in the last 
couplet, elevates it far above all common-place. Yet 
there is nothing in the style, nor the cast of the sentiment, 
which might not be employed with corresponding effect 
on a sacred theme. 

The following stanzas are almost unrivalled in the 
combination of poetry with painting, pathos with fancy, 
grandeur with simplicity, and romance with reality : — 

' How sleep the brave, who sink to rest, 
By all their country's wishes blest ! 
When spring, with dewy fingers cold, 
Returns to deck their hallowed mould. 
She there shall dress a sweeter sod 
Than fancy's feet have ever trod. 

By fairy-hands their knell is rung, 
By forms unseen their dirge is sung ; 



59 

There honor comes, a pilgrim gray, 

To bless the turf that wraps their clay ; 

And freedom shall awhile repair, 

To dwell a weeping hermit there.' — Collins. 

The unfortunate author of these inimitable lines, a 
little before his death— in a lucid interval of that madness 
to which a wounded spirit had driven him — was found 
by a visitor with the bible in his hand. * You see,' said 
the poor sufferer, * I have only one book left ; but it is 
the best.' 

It is too late in the age of mental philosophy to make 
the assertion that poetry has no power to pour its notes 
of sweet and transporting melody into the quiet recesses 
of a deeply humbled heart. The genius of poetry comes 
at the call of the holy affections. The most enduring 
monuments of mind on earth are the productions of the 
muse. Homer, embalmed in his own immortal verse, 
survives his country ; Maro is destined to a longer 
remembrance than the 'eternal city' — and later poets 
have exerted an influence over the hearts of men and 
the manners of generations, other than those in whose 
time they wrote, far mightier than regal authority or the 
patronage of governments could command. But, if a 
stranger to the poetry of the world from Hesiod to Byron 
should inquire in what other poetry than that found in 
the bible is the purity, the sublimity, the pathos, the 
elevating and spirit sustaining themes of our holy religion 
best illustrated and most invitingly presented to the eye 
of taste and genius, — we must, with a few reservations, 
say — it is yet unwritten. 



60 

SAUL OF TARSUS. — A SONNET. 

On, Saul of Tarsus ! spear and shield upraise — 

Thy heart beats high with persecuting ire, 
Upon thy brow ambition's lightning plays, 

Thou breathest threat'nings, rocks, and chains, and fire ; 
Thou art all haste and stirring hot to do 

The bidding of the bloody priests, and break 
Tiieir tliunders o'er the sainted band ; but rue 

Thy pride ! above, around thee, voices wake — 
More than the noon-day light from heaven descends, 

And Saul, the persecutor, trails the dust ; 
Prostrate he has — his iron spirit bends 

Subdued by Him he dared to call accurst ; 
But now he owns the voice, the light, the power, 
Of ONE whose word will make the mightiest cower. 



CENTENNIAL ODE. — by charlesspuague. 

The two hundredth anniversary of the settlement of 
Boston was distinguished by the efforts of genius worthy 
to 'notch the centuries' in their course. We have, 
from the importance of the occasion and the established 
reputations of the orator and the poet, noticed their 
respective productions separately — as things not of every 
day occurrence ; and here, if criticism is most at home 
with burning eye and iron pen when rending into tatters 
the webb of an author's thoughts, there will be little 
chance for critical display in the subject before us. It 
is preposterous for any one to think of melting by the 



61 

warmth of his hand the glittering diamonds. While the 
icicles which hold the rainbow in their brilliant transpa- 
rence may dissolve, the true diamonds will still shine on 
unchanged by contact, collision, bright ever in storm 
and sunshine. 

If one should ask what was the machinery of Spragiie's 
poem — what its plot *? We answer — it has none. His 
poem is the lofty discoursings of the muse as she stood 
on the elevation of two centuries, looked over the past, 
and kindled in prospect of the future. On such an 
occasion it was meet that the poet should commence in 
the spirit of sacred invocation : — 

Not to the Pagan's mount I turn, 

For inspiration now : 
Olympus and its gods I spurn — 

Pure One, be with me, Thou! — 

After one of the most philosophically correct delinea- 
tions of the character of the pilgrim fathers, Mr. Sprague 
calls up from the silence of death 

' those fated bands, 

Whose monarch tread was on these broad, green lands,' — 

and follows the retiring trail of the mighty forest hunters 
until the frail grass is now scarcely bowed by their step. 
How cheerless was the extinction of the Indian ! 

Cold, with the beast he slew, he sleeps ; 

O'er him no filial spirit weeps ; 
No crowds throng round, no anthem-notes ascend, 
To bless his coming and embalm his end ; 
Even that he lived, is for his conqueror's tongue, 
By foes alone his death-song must be sung ; 



62 

No chronicles but theirs shall tell 
His mournful doom to future times ; 

IMay these upon his virtues dwell, 
And in his fate fore;et his crimes. 



Mr. Sprague's ode, than which no better one may be 
printed for a century to come, closes with a holy 
aspiration of praise to the God of the pilgrims. 



JOSIAH aUINCY, L. L. D. 

Without acknowledging a belief in the doctrines of 
phrenology, we admit that nature sometimes labels her 
noblest workmanship with its inscriptions in which there 
are no mistakes — palpable indications of mental energy 
and intellectual power which stand out in bold develope- 
ment in the expressive features. Mr. Quincy, the 
president of Harvard, has a countenance of the first 
order, which lights up with every emotion of his mind 
when it is excited; but it is his forehead that most 
distinguishes him and gives him no mean claim to be 
considered a model of intellectual statuary. 

Having lately witnessed the display of his eloquence 
before the thousands who stood before the centennial 
altar, we max be permitted to express our ardent wishes 
that the ancient university over which he presides may 
catch something of his bold, energetic spirit ; and learn, 
at least, that it is of nearly as much importance how as 



63 

what is spoken in public addresses. There is no need 
that we follow the chain of his argument in an oration 
so widely distributed and celebrated as president Quincy's 
centennial ; yet we may say, that when we heard his 
powerful sketch of the pilgrim character, and saw the 
mighty dead breathing and living again under the strong 
inspiration of the orator's genius, we felt as if no nation 
could boast a descent so illustrious as the American 
people, or better honor a noble descent than in thus 
recounting the deathless virtues of the fathers of religious 
and civil liberty in the western world. 

In president Quincy's own language we repeat : — 
Human happiness has no perfect security hut freedom; — 
freedom none hut virtue ; — virtue none hut knowledge ; 
and neither freedom, nor virtue, nor knowledge has any 
vigor, or immortal hope, except in the principles of the 
Christian faith, and in the sanction of the Christian 
religion. 



ALL IS VANITY. 

The proud world is fading, dear, 
Like the leaves of autumn sere, 
FalUng round the dying year — 

All is vanity. 

Grandeur's star declines apace, 
Mighty ones have veiled the face, 
Death hath won ambition's race — 
All is vanity. 



64 

Pleasure painted mountains green, 
Groves with babbling streams between ; 
Darkness hung around the scene — 
All is vanity. 

Friends and lovers near thee now, 
Faithful to their fervent vow ; 
Low in dust they soon shall bow — 
All is vanity. 

Wealth and home embowered with love, 
Shelter thee, a wounded dove ; 
Fortune's sun now hides above — 
All is vanity. 

Heaven, above the wrecks of time, 
Spans the universe sublime. 
Change nor storm are in its clime — ■ 
Blest eternity ! 



PART OF AN ADDRESS, 
Delivered at Boston, April 7, 1828, before the Hibernian Relief Society. 

Wherever the feet of man may roam there is one 
delightful image present to his fancy. It penetrates 
beyond the region of the imagination, and takes deep 
hold on the heart. It is the love of country — not that 
selfish affection which pours itself out on individual 
inheritance — the parcelled glebe or amassed treasures ; 



65 

it lakes a wider, holier range, and loves not only tlie 
mountains, the vales, the streams, the placid lakes, the 
soft fleecy clouds, the deep transparent skies — the loud 
storm, the tempest gloom even — but the image of intel- 
lectual beauty, above all the rest, enchants the soul of 
the wanderer. 

No nation has so low a place in the hearts of men, 
but that the mention of its name shall awaken an 
intellectual form of giant grandeur, of loveliness, of 
melancholy, of exalted patriotism ; or of wild cruelty, 
and tyrannic perfidy. Here is in fact the tribunal of 
nations. In the loneHness of the human heart, the deep 
and quiet recesses of thought, the spectres of national 
character rise to receive applause or disapprobation ; 
they come from the far off world beyond the flood ; they 
burst from the catacombs of the Nile, they shake the 
marble ruins of the Acropolis, and rise from the tombs 
of Rome — and, pale or glorious, dark or lovely, await 
the decisions of posterity. 

Yet the image of one's own country comes to the soul 
with all the freshness of life. It is a mid-day dream, 
entrancing the soul at high noon. The sweet charm of 
memory combines the graces of moral beauty, the 
breathing forms of early friendship, the majesty of high 
patriotic example, and the tones of the minstrel bard, 
into such a vision of felicity, that it is to be cherished, 
loved — almost adored. The sons of some nations have 
before them the broad field of their country's renown, 
almost stainless, and far and wide reflecting the unpol- 
luted splendors of national honor. Such have only to 



66 

drink in the enthusiasm of their native air to be what 
their fathers were — worthy of the choicest honors of 
earth, and to wear the garlands that have been twined 
by the seraph hand of female loveliness. Such have 
only to read their country's history, to inhale their 
country's spirit. 

But what more than mortal meed of honors shall be 
awarded to those whose high designs, whose virtuous 
sympathies, brilliant genius, lofty daring, and sublime 
memorials, have thriven and been established in defiance 
of circumstances — against the storms of fate, the thun- 
ders of power, and the undying bitterness of a causeless 
'hatred ? What green garland of immortality shall crown 
the brows that have been bared to the pitiless winds of 
misfortune, and were yet radiant with the light of intellect 
and ' the searching victories of mind ?' 

There is a lovely island which is washed by the bright 
waves of the Atlantic ; there is such a charm lingering 
around its classic ground that whoever has ever fixed 
his eyes upon its calm scenery can never — never forget 
Ireland. So great is the antiquity of its institutions, 
that when the ruin lay like a thunder cloud on the 
horizon of the Roman Empire, and the Goths and 
Vandals rolled their barbarian hordes over the Campania, 
and swept Italy with the besom of destruction ; the 
sweet Emerald Isle was a refuge for the learned and 
virtuous of other countries. The terror of a falling 
nation never reached this sequestered and beautiful 
island ; the shrieks of the victims were lost in the wild 
passes and glens of the Alps, save when the demon 



67 

hordes, like an avalanche, broke from the eternal brow 
of the mountains, and shook the vallies of northern 
Europe. How pleasant here to recognize the begin- 
nings of literary distinction — the ardent love of letters 
that have ever distinguished the Irish nation ! These 
illustrious refugees scattered the seeds of literary inquiry, 
and became themselves incorporated with a people who 
were soon called to meet the wave of Norman conquest 
that had rolled over England and Scotland. The Danish 
yoke, once imposed on these spirit breathing men, sat 
heavily, and was indignantly thrown off in the deadly 
tug of war. Ireland then had her kings of noble deeds ; 
she had her Brian, who, one thousand years after the 
birth of Christ, in the eighty-eighth year of his age, strew- 
ed Clontarfs bloody field with Danes, and poured out 
his life in the arms of victory. 

Then — then, oh, my native country ; invited by 
intestine broils, the cross of St. George emerged from 
the waters, and the English threw their pale around thy 
Dublin ! 

1 will no longer follow the thread of history. I will 
suppress my sighs. I will lean over Erin's broken harp 
in sad, heart-burdened silence. I will not call up feelings 
that should inflame a continent. I will not uncover 
bloody scenes. A minister of the religion of the blessed 
Prince of Peace, I will stoop over the wounded, the 
broken, the flying ; and to him whose life-blood is fast 
ebbing, I will say — forgive the heart that conceived thy 
death, and curse not the hand that gave the blow. Oh, 
could I but say to him who dies in a distant land of exile 



68 

—thine own Emerald Isle is blooming for thy children, 
and thy children's children, and no hand of the oppres- 
sor is there ! There shines the star of freedom purified 
from the disastrous eclipse of six hundred years — ^there 
flowers are springing freshly on the graves of thy coun- 
try's martyrs! — A minister of peace, I shall not detail 
the history of the fifty thousand Irish vt)lunteers who 
declared the holy intention of giving liberty to their 
country — nor the strong league of United Irishmen who 
rose up at the voice of the sweetest eloquence that ever 
thrilled in the forum or the field. Every cord of this 
league was sundered by the sword and the bayonet, and 
' the smoking flax' gave a frightful splendor to the flames 
of civil war. I would not call up the names of Fitz- 
gerald, O'Connor, the pale, lovely ghost of Emmet, 
dear to the heart of female fondness — nor yet, the war- 
like Tone, or the She ares, to. sigh in this blessed 
evening zephyr, and accuse the strong arm of power 
with violence. No, no. As dearly as I love my country, 
let the shades of her patriots appeal for justice to the 
high court of eternity where they now inhabit — and oh 
that some gentle hand might avert the storm thai shall 
arise, rending, outbreaking and charged with retribution, 
should the day of reckoning come ! 

Should the cold hearted, with disdainful calmness, ask 
the questions — What right has Ireland to all this sympa- 
thy ? What^ redeeming qualities has she to shed a 
beautiful lustre over the story of her sufferings ? What 
gifted sons of song have ever swept her lyre ? — with a 
reproving silence, I would point them to the world's 



69 

history. But should the student of human nature, witli 
a sincere desire to learn the truth, ask questions of 
similar import — should the young patriot, whose heart 
is just swelling with the proud events of past ages and the 
splendid movements of the present, inquire why this 
dismantled country sustains such a place in the affections 
of her children wherever thrown on the world's wide 
bosom — or why the name of Ireland is dear to the friends 
of freedom in every nation under heaven, I would say, 
there is a soul in the country which disdains the shackles 
of its body politic — there is a heart there, around which 
flow the generous impulses and life blood of freedom. 
An Irishman in chains, standing on the very verge of an 
untimely grave, has had the spirit and the voice to make 
the tyrant of his doom tremble on the rotten seat of 
justice. Untitled, unaided as he was, with the death of 
a traitor impending over his youthful head, one uttered 
the voice of his country full dreadful to the minions of 
power. Hear him. ' TFhen my country takes her place 
among the nations of the earth, then, and not till then, 
lei my epitaph he written."* Oh, I would dwell on his 
loved name, and this hall should resound with an epitaph 
for him that would outlive ^ the storied urn' — but I will 
not call up an association of thought to awaken your 
bursting sorrows ; for your own American Emmet sleeps 
in death. 

If we look for the laurels of Ireland's military re- 
nown, we shall not find them blooming on her beautiful 
landscape only. We must untwine the garlands of other 
lands and tear from them the proudest evergreens ; we 



70 

shall diminish the banners of the Island Queen ; we 
shall wither the lilies of France, and weaken the strong 
Eagle's pinion. But why all these exotic plants of renown? 
This question hurls an accusation against thrones, and is 
the voice of outcry against the arm of the oppressor. — 
The senates of the Emerald Isle- — her fields — her cabi- 
nets, her forum, bar and altar, should have gathered up 
her choicest sons, and the light of their genius would 
have shown like a new day, doubling the effulgence of 
years gone by. These plants of genius were torn away 
from their native soil in the disruption of storms and in 
the deep agony of separation ; the parent stock, the ex- 
uberant root, they left behind them, and bore with them 
wherever they roamed the bleeding fibres of affection. 
The same hand that hath been laid cold and heavy and 
excruciating on the sensitive population of Ireland has 
indeed struck the mountain wastes of Scotland ; but 
the hills felt it not, nor did her hardy sons fall under the 
concussion like the delicate plants of the green isle. 
Scotland has been rescued in a great degree by her 
literati, who have, in the absence of physical power, after 
losing the balance of empire, substituted a moral power, 
before which the nations of the earth have bowed down 
in idolatry ; yet even this noble expedient of exchan- 
ging the trappings of royality for a despotism over the 
heart, could not have succeeded in Ireland where the 
voice of her patriots and the songs of her poets were, 
like the fabled strains of the sw^an, the premonitions of 
death. 

But there are no figures of rhetoric that may reach 
the heart of Ireland's sorrows ; she mourns her loveliest 



71 

sons in exile, and even the glory they bind around their 
brows in a stranger land, awakens sorrow at home — for 
there should the sun of their glory rise — and there 
should they rest after life's brief triumphs were over. 
The sorrow stricken seer of Israel, had Ireland been his 
country, would have poured out the melancholy words : 
^Mine eyes do fail with tears, my bowels are troubled, for 
the destruction of the daughter of my people ; because 
the children and the sucklings swoon in the streets of 
the city. They say to their mothers, where is corn and 
.wine ? When they swooned as the wounded in the streets 
of the city, when their soul was poured out into their 
mother^s bosom."* 



S ONNET — CONSTANTINOPLE. 

The Cresent spans thy gate, Byzantium ! 

Barbaric hordes defy thee in thy might — 
In wild, far gleaming sheen and pomp tliey coinje 

To dare the Roman to the deadly figiit — 
They roll the storm of strong invasion on 

And Calvary's sign is shaken in the sky ; 
The warrior band that shook the world are gone, 

The breach is made and Constantine must die ; 
Last of his race — alone — in fate's thick gloom 

His gleaming broadsword lit him to his tomb, 
And, where he fell, dark boughs of Cyprus wave — 

While eastern Rome, a meteor quenched in blood. 
The earth's proud lord, became the Moslem's slave, 
And wailing swept along Marmora's chrystal flood. 



72 
M02^TG0AiERY'S WORLD BEFORE THE FLOOD. 

The muse of the pious Montgomery, in selecting the 
subject of his poem from the dreamy world which we dis- 
cover so dimly beyond the prismatic waters cf the deluge, 
opened a wide field for the display of his fancy and for 
the creations of his genius. — Antediluvian history is 
but a narrow genealogical line drawn from Eden to 
Arrarat. On each line of this line of descent, nations 
rose, and vast transactions came into being. The poet 
may people this waste with such an order of intellect, 
and such classes of events as shall please him, if he do 
not contradict the record of the Scriptures. 

Montgomery, in his ^ World before the Flood,' des- 
cribes only the transactions of a few days and nights — 
but, by way of minstrel and episode, brings into view the 
remoter scenes of Abel's death and the dying hour of 
Adam and Eve, the first of mankind. — The time of the 
poem is laid in the two last days of Enoch's walk on 
earth, when the progeny of Cain, headed by a giant king, 
and directed by a sorcerer of tremendous power, invaded 
the glen of the patriarchs, where they, remote from 
pride and lust, worshipped in primeval simplicity. As 
the host of Cain approaches, Javan, who has, for years, 
been a wanderer from the glen, deserts from the inva- 
ding army and hastens to inform the patriarchs of their 
impending ruin. He treads once more the scenes of 
his childhood — and, in a bower not unkn wn to him, 
discovers Zillah, the idol of his earliest affections, asleep. 
He leans over her, and hears her in an unquiet dream 



73 

pronounce his name ; he retires. With a melodious 
instrument of his own invention he fills the grove with 
unwonted music, and Zillah is awakened by strains that 
seem to her nothing less than angelic. 

The incidents which rapidly crowd themselves into 
the poem at this point of time are highly exciting. After 
Javan's happy reception by the patriarchs, and the cele- 
bration of the great anniversary of Sacrifice, instituted 
by Adam, the destroyer came like a flood upon the 
quiet dwellers in the glen. They were taken captive 
and carried into the camp of the giant. Here Enoch 
prophesied of the destruction of the idolatrous host, and 
when the rage of the monarch and his captains could be 
restrained no longer, and they rushed like bloody tigers 
upon the prophet who was unrolling before them the 
awful scroll of prophecy, he ims not, for God took him. 
His mantle descended on Javan, who led the patriarchal 
captives unharmed through the host of amazed enemies. 
The mount of Paradise was in sight in the distant 
western horizon. The flame of the cherubim sword 
played upon its lofty summit. . The giant king and the 
host of the idolaters were filled with rage against 
heaven, and an unconquerable desire to storm the site 
of Eden and possess again the garden of God. But now 

' Red in the west the burning Mount, arrayed 
With tenfold terror by incumbent shade, 
(For moon and stars were wrapt in dunnest gloom) 
Glared like a torch amidst creation's tomb.' 

Supernatural horror, amazement, omens of unex- 



74 

plained import, conspired to distract and paralize the 
impious invaders — and tliey miserably perished by their 
own hands. 

The World before the Flood is in ten cantos, and is 
brief enough not to tire, even if its high poetic merit did 
not delis^ht, the tasteful reader. 



THE AUTUMAL EVENING. 

The mooa 
Is up, and all the jewelled stars are set 
Deep in the mild cerulean. No chang:e 
Is on the face of heaven. The fields of air, 
Like silver-spangledb-wns spread out. 
No wild winds sweep or clouds obscure. — 
All, all is holy — as if boundless love 
From Eden had baptised the element 
In its sweet waves of blessedness. 
But earth — oh earth, thou faded one ! 
Thy melancholy tresses lowly hang 
Like willow branches o'er the ancient graves- 
Thy summer robes are old and gray, — 
Thy voice is mournful, like the distant sound 
Of lonely w^aterfalls heard solemnly 
At midnight hour when other voices sleep. 

Hail autumn evening ! 
Best time to muse along the weeping streams 
Where vegetation hastens to decay 
Piled in exuberance of fragrant death — 
For here a lonely whisper speaks to man 



75 



Of winter clothed in winding sheets of snow — 
Of spring beyond — and thus a lesson gives 
To him whose footsteps turn the falling leaf, 
And tells him that the places where he trcada 
Shall know him not again ; but on beyond 
The dreary winter of the tomb the spring 
Of virtue shines in its unchanging green. 
How happy they who see the olive leaf; 
The token of that rest ! They hear at night 
The singing of the turtle dove. They know- 
That Jesus lives — and that his Paradise 
Hath many roses blooming fresh for them. — 
And many crowns are there. And harps 
Strung to immortal melodies of bliss. 

Go, autumn, haste away, — let winter come, 
Tliat spring may sooner bathe my head 
In its cool waters and its scented dews ! 
Time endeth : but the heaven of heavens shall hold 
The peaceable, the just, the pure in heart, 
Who dwell as pilgrims in the vale of earth. 



LOCH LOMOND. 

Scottish scenery is of the . grandest and most 
picturesque descriptions, and yet it often has a moral 
association connected with it which lends additional sub- 
limity to nature's boldest oudines. Many circumstances 
have united to give this double celebrity to Scotland. 
The clanship of the inhabitants, — the fearless, idomiiablc 
character of the soldiery, and every man was a soldier, — 



76 

the frequent internal contests, as well as movetnents of 
foreign offence, or defence against foreign aggression, — 
have marked Scotland's lakes and mountains, her vales 
and casdes, with the deep traces of battle, of deathless 
achievements, — while the songs of her minstrels, and, 
more than all, the unsurpassed genius of her literati have 
created a broad halo of glory all around her wildly classic 
territory. The eye of the traveller is not more attracted 
by the rugged peak that disparts the clouds in their 
passage than by the historical reminiscence that clings 
forever to the bleak rock like the moss which woos the 
moisture of heaven to its granite bed. Through these 
associations the gloomy cave becomes an object of interest, 
the sunless gorge, down deep at the base of the fearful 
Trosacs, is sought out because it has been embalmed in 
song as the jaws of fate to conflicting warriors ; and every 
tranquil lake, or roaring linn, or broad estuary become 
mirrors in which the departed rise to view in the strug- 
gles, the triumphs, the last catastrophes of border and 
international warfare. 

It is not within the limits of our intention to note the 
writers whose living productions have contributed to 
render Scottish scenery so redolent in the recollections 
of national virtue, bravery, crime, ambition, and glory. 
We are only to present Loch Lomond, a lovely lake that 
sleeps as calm as at its first creation amidst the cold hills 
and thunder-crested mountains of Dumbarton and Stir- 
lingshire. 

Lake Lomond is situated in Dumbartonshire and partly 
in Stirlingshire ; it is twenty-eight miles in length, and 



77 

embosoms thirty-three islands — some of which are inhab- 
ited, while others are covered with antique ruins concealed 
in the umbrageous groves of ancient yews, and others 
still are wild, precipitous rocks where the lone osprey or 
the sea eagle dwells. The whole lake is shadowed by 
hoary mountains or ancient woods. The Grampian 
mountains terminate at its southeast corner, while in the 
northern part of Stirlingshire, Ben Lomond rises to the 
height of three thousand two hundred feet above the lake 
which washes its base. It would be impossible to do 
justice to the scenery of this lovely lake in a hundred 
representations — yet the sketch we give is a faithful and 
striking part of the imposing whole. 

It is a remarkable fact, that in the great earthquake 
which destroyed Lisbon in Portugal in 1755, the waters 
of Loch l^omond rose and fell with sympathetic and 
violent agitation. 



RIGHT REV. REGINALD HEBER, D. D. 

Late Lord Bishop of Calcutta. 

The life of this distinguish divine of the English 
Church, compiled by his widow, has lately been published 
in this city by the Protestant Episcopal Press. A biogra- 
phy composed from the lamented bishop's correspondence, 
unpublished poems, and private papers, cannot fail of 
7 



78 

giving the reader a deep acquaintance with the progress 
of mind which distinguished this luminary through his 
active, useful life. Reginald Heber was born April 21, 
1783, at Malpas in the county of Chester, England — 
of which place his father was for many years co-rector. 
He was entered at Brazen Nose College in the Univer- 
sity of Oxford in the autumn of 1800. Heber was 
uncommonly successful throughout his university course. 
It was in the spring of the year 1803, that he wrote, as 
a college exercise for a particular occasion, his celebrated 
poem, ^ Palestine.' 

Of the dehvery of this poem, Blackwood's Edinburgh 
Magazine gives the following description : — None who 
heard Reginald Heber recite his ' Palestine' in that 
magnificent theatre, will ever forget his appearance — so 
interesting and impressive. — It w^as known that his old 
father was somewhere sitting among the crowded au- 
dience, when his universally admired son ascended the 
rostrum ; and we have heard that the sudden thunder of 
applause which then arose so shook his frame, weak and 
wasted by long illness, that he never recovered it, and 
may be said to have died of the joy dearest to a parent's 
heart. 

Although Mrs. Heber seems to doubt the immediate 
effect of this joy upon his father's life as stated above, 
fne description she has given of the same scene, written 
by an eye witness after an interval of twenty-four years., 
is scarcely less graphic : — « Reginald Heber's recitation, 
like that of all poets whom we have heard recite, was 
altogether untrammelled by the critical laws of elocution., 



79 

which were not set at defiance, but either by the poet 
unknown or forgotten ; and there was a charm in his 
somewhat melancholy voice, that occasionally faltered, 
less from a feeling of the solemnity and even grandeur 
of the scene, of which he was himself the conspicuous 
object — though that feeling did suffuse his pale, ingenuous, 
and animated countenance — than from the deeply felt 
sanctity of his subject, comprehending the most awful 
mysteries of God's revelation to man. As his voice 
grew bolder and more sonorous in the hush, the audience 
felt that this was not the mere display of the skill and 
ingenuity of a clever youth, the accidental triumph of 
an accomplished versifier over his compeers, in the dex- 
terity of scholarship, which is all that can generally be 
said truly of such exhibitions, — ^but that here was a poet 
indeed, not only of bright promise, but of high achieve- 
ment, — one whose name was already written in the roll 
of the immortals. This poetry is now incorporated ior 
ever with the poetry of England.' 

When Reginald Heber returned from the theatre, 
surrounded by his friends, with every hand stretched out 
to congratulate, and every voice raised to praise him, he 
withdrew from the circle ; and his mother, who impatient 
of his absence, went to look for him, found him in his 
room on his knees giving thanks to God, not so much 
for the talents which had, on that day, raised him to honor 
but that those talents had enabled him to bestow unmixed 
happiness on his parents. 

Towards the middle of the year 1805, Mr. Heber, 
m company with a distinguished friend, made the tour of 



80 

northern Europe and visited Norway, Sweden, Russia, 
Hungary and Germany. After his return, he commenced 
his ecclesiastical course as a humble ' parish priest' in 
Hodnet. 

The particularity with which his biographer has made 
Heber speak his prejudices as well as his virtues, has 
detracted from the perfection of his moral portrait. We 
find him to be less than an angel. He writes thus of the 
Methodists, meaning, we suppose. Dissenters in general : 
— ' The Methodists in Hodnet are, thank God, not very 
numerous, and I hope to diminish them still more ; they 
are, however, sufficiently numerous to serve as a spur 
to my emulation.' — ^ The Methodists are neither very 
numerous nor very active ; they have no regular meetings 
but assemble from great distances to meet a favorite 
preacher. Yet I have sometimes thought, and it has 
really made me uncomfortable, that since Rowland Hill's 
visit to the country, my congregation w^as thinner.' 

When higher advanced in church dignity he forbade 
his curates to open their chapels to Rowland Hill. 

We have not space to follow Reginald Heber through 
his successful course of authorship and church prefer- 
ment. He was the angel of the church in India. He 
has given his name to deathless ' Palestine.' The deep, 
rich, solemn numbers of his poetry illustrated scenes 
where the harp of David gathered its inspiration ; but 
in no one of his productions, does the simplicity of his 
sacred classics glow with such purified splendor, as in the 
Missionary Hymn, commencing — 

' From Greenland's icy mountains,' &c. 



81 

SONNET. . 

THE DEPARTURE OF A WAR SHIP. 

She leaves the strand with loud hurrahs and song, 
The cannon's voice, and trumpet's shriek along. 
Invokes from heaven her country's unbound breeze 
To roll her bulwarks on the seething seas ; 
It comes — and fresh with incense breathing flowers 
From murnuuing, whispering, love-inspiring bowers, 
Bears shout and tarewell — sigh and bursting prayer 
In one deep gush of balmy evening air. 

The sun is down — the warrior ship is gone — 
And ocean's waters running heedless on. 
' I'll wait for thee,' the dark eyed virgin sighs. 
Whilst thou, around the globe in foreign skies, 
Shalt roll the standard sheet of Washington, 
And bring me baek thyself— thy duty done.' 



OUR COUNTRY. 

Delivered in Bennet-street Church, Boston^ on the afternoon of the Ath of 
July, 1830. 

' For they got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither dil their 
own arm save them; but thy right hand, and thy arm, and the light of thy 
countenance, because thou hadst a favor unto them.'— Psa/w xliv. 3. 

The commemoration of past events has a very early 
(late in the annals of the world's history. Israel had 
appointed seasons for rejoicing, when the remembrances 
df other days crowded upon the mind. Greece and 
Rome abounded with memorials of signal deliverances, 
7* 



82 

and splendid victories. The eras when their existence 
commenced and the achievements of their bold warriors 
and stern patriots were, at stated seasons, brought freshly 
to their remembrance by the monuments of antiquity 
and the festivals of their religion. England has her days 
of song and chivalry, of humiliation and prayer, com- 
memorative of wonderful events in her history. But 
what nation on the globe has greater reason to rejoice 
than the one, the anniversary of whose independence we 
this day commemorate. The deliverance of this country 
from foreign aggression, and a long-continued train of 
evils, is the theme of our rejoicing. The recollection of 
this proud event brings up around each heart a host o^ 
the most interesting associations. We are at once thrown 
upon the day that tried men's souls. The story of that 
day's suffering and wrong, peril and death, defeat and 
victory, written as it is in the blood and tears, the 
privations and sorrows of the patriotic men who dared 
to do, or die, is unfolded to their children's children ; 
and we have come hither to gather strength and courage 
over the glorious record. The orator for God, the 
statesman and the scholar, have made it the subject of 
their theme, and the burden of their song. And each 
revolving year it has been received with renewed feelings 
of joy and acclamations of pleasure. But have we not, 
too often, while doing homage to the patriots of the 
revolution, forgotten the Almighty hand that preserved 
this country in the terrible conflict, and conducted us in 
safety through the storm of war, and the desolations of 
an overbearing foe ! The song of praise has not always 



83 

been of God. The voice of rejoicing seldom rose higher 
than the ru2;ged passes that frown defiance to the world. 

We are here — not to be forgetful of what God, by our 
fathers has achieved for this land of promise — but while 
we would give the events, to which this day more 
immediately belongs, their legitimate place in each heart, 
we would be reminded of the interest Heaven has always 
taken in our affairs, and indulge in reflections intimately 
connected with the sublime occasion. 

The pilgrim fathers were conducted to these shores 
by an Almighty hand. They might have passed to other 
lands, far from the agressors, and been safe. There 
were countries nearer home that would have gladly 
welcomed them to their shelters. But a mysterious 
influence rested upon their minds; and, although it was 
a hazardous enterprize, teeming with danger, they rallied 
their broken spirits, braved the winds of heaven, the 
storms of the angry deep, and, in hope against hope, in 
the very depth of winter, sprang upon the ragged rock 
of Plymouth, bearing with them the seeds of a holy 
religion and a vast empire. 

Their origin and national character, form a strikmg 
circumstance in the history of the country. They were 
of no plebian race, neither were they all of high patrician 
birth ; but generally selected from that class, which, in 
England especially, constitutes the very best and most 
enterprising of her citizens. They were inflexible, brave 
and true. Independence of mind, a fearless spirit, with 
an unparalleled strength of purpose were characteristics 
by which they were distinguished. Another and a far 



84 

different race might have been our fathers ; but God had 
high and important purposes in view, and he therefore 
selected men who possessed the power and were furnished 
with the materials to lay the deep and broad foundations 
of a nation, destined to be unexampled and glorious. 

They were pious — the followers of the meek and 
Jowly Jesus, Had they been the disciples of Mahomet 
or the worshippers of idol gods, their children would not 
have stood where they do this day, nor tlieir country 
present, after the lapse of centuries, such a sublime 
spectacle to an admiring world. 

The nature of the constitutions and laws they framed 
and adopted ; the moral tendency, the strictness of their 
religious sentiments, all give evidence of an overruling 
Providence. Had the laws by which they were governed 
been less rigid and severe, their morals more pliable and 
their faidi cast in a more polished mould, it is a question 
whether their children would have retained, for so many 
yeai's, customs and manners, which, though antiquated 
and ridiculed by the refined and sceptical, have contributed 
in a great measure to preserve the American citizen as 
yet, from many of the glaring absurdities and extravagant 
notions of his trans-atlantic brethern. On the whole we 
may consider the character of the pilgrims, their conduct 
and views, as not only beneficial, but absolutely necessary, 
in a religious, moral and political point of light, in forming 
the basis of a^reat and highly intelligent community. 

Their preservation from the scalping-knife of the 
savage and from the sword of France, is another mark 
of divine favor. No personal bravery, no tower of 



85 

strength could have secured them from the accumulated 
dangers that beset them. The country was then covered 
with thousands of the red warriors, armed and on the 
watch for their prey, urged on by Frenchmen who 
thirsted for blood. Early in their history we also mark 
a gracious interposition of Divine Providence in the 
discomfiture and defeat of a powerful armament. Ere 
it had reached these shores, the Lord commissioned the 
elements to fight against it, and the proud fleet was 
scattered, dismasted, and broken by the four winds. 

And when the seeds of war sprang up in the breasts 
of the revolutionary heroes, were not the councils of 
Great Britain strangely perplexed ? The voice of wisdom 
forsook the senate and council chamber, and the spirit of 
her king, her nobles, and people cowered to a base and 
palpably ignorant policy. With haughty indiiFerence to 
the cry of oppression and a vain reliance upon the 
puissant arm of her soldiery, she flung down the gauntlet, 
crossed the rubicon, and recklessly plunged into an 
inglorious war, which she imagined would result in the 
chastisement and humiliation of the men she insultingly 
termed hoys, — rebels to her crown and dignity. She 
had not counted the cost when she dared her colonies to 
the combat ; and sore and bitter was her repentance. 

At this period, big with the destinies of millions, when 
all that is dear and valuable to man was at stake, and 
the hopes of America were on the point of being blasted 
forever, the immortal Washington appeared on the 
arena of battle. A mysterious and all-wise Providence 
seemed to designate him as the angel that was to lead 



86 

the American armies to victory and conquest. He soon 
redeemed the pledge his opening campaign gave to a 
deeply anxious and troubled people. His course was 
brilliant and successful. He met the veterans of a 
hundred hard-fought fields, wearing the laurels of victory, 
and they were beaten and slain ; the country rescued 
from the invader's sword, and its rights and privileges 
confirmed and acknowledged by the voice of nations and 
the wisdom of our fathers. 

The framing of the constitution, that great pillar of our 
country's glory, is not among the least of the blessings 
by which these United States are distinguished. 

But who can read the page that opens upon the 
fiftietli anniversary of our independence, and not be 
Ftruck with astonishment at the death of the two venerable 
patriots, Jefferson and Adams, who were both on the 
morning of that auspicious day, basking in the sunshine 
of a nation's smile; but, ere the sun had set, were 
gathered with their fathers? — who can pass over this 
imperishable mark of divine interference, and not feel the 
full force of our observations ? 

The prosperity which has always crowned this country 
— more especially since her independence was established, 
is further proof that God is with us. She has increased 
in territory and in population, in riches, in enterprize, and 
renown. Her religious, literary and political institutions 
will bear a proud comparison even with those of Great 
Britain, France and Germany. 

From what has been said, we may fairly infer, that 
America is destined, at no distant period, to take a more 



87 

elevated and important station in controlling the destinies 
of the earth. If she is but true to herself, she can never 
retrograde. She must prosper, gathering strength and 
stability as she advances. The Almighty seems to have 
determined in her favor. As long as the religion of 
Jesus is permitted to lie deeply rooted in her institutions, 
she cannot fall. The Rock of Ages is as yet her abiding 
place. She is supported by pillars of strength and beauty, 
that suffer no decay, and that bid defiance to the hand 
of the oppressor and the tooth of time. Stupendous are 
the purposes, to accomplish which, she is to be the 
honored instrument. In the youth and vigor of her days, 
untrammelled and unconfined, bearing in her bosom the 
elements, that have already given omens of great promise, 
what may she not perform ! Already hath her voice 
broken in thunder across the Atlantic ! The fast-anchored 
isle has felt the potent spell of her giant power, and 
yielding to necessity, she has at length emancipated a 
gallant and generous people who had groaned for many 
centuries under a galling and ignominious thraldom. In 
this long deferred act of common justice, we see some of 
the fruits of her noble example, and the beginning of that 
deference which will one day be paid more promptly and 
openly to these United States throughout the world. 

Her voice is swelling to a louder note in other lands, 
and wherever the star-gemmed banner sweeps the free 
air of heaven, there will her influence be felt, and the 
fame of her doings create a flame and arouse a spirit 
which rivers cannot quench, nor armed muhitudes sub- 
due. The beacon of freedom to both hemispheres, its 



88 

light will soon blaze on every island, sea and mountain 
on the globe, until myriads, guided by its mellow radiance, 
shall proclaim universal emancipation from chains and 
slavery, and man assume his legitimate place in the great 
scale of being. 

A yet more glorious contemplation is afforded by this 
animating subject. For achievements of moral sublimity, 
never emulated nor surpassed since the commencement 
of time, America stands eminently conspicuous. Emana- 
tions that bear the royal signature of Heaven cluster 
around us on every hand. Movements of a high and 
lofty import, which cast far into the shade all that has 
ever taken place on the earth since the hour of man's 
redemption, seem to be shaking the universe, and strongly 
intimate the near approach of wonderful events. Christians 
in former times waged war on the borders of the enemy's 
dominions only ; their battles were but skirmishes. But 
their sons have resolved to penetrate the thickest ranks, 
and to attack the strongest fortresses ; and they aim at 
nothing short of the complete overthrow and downfall of 
the empire of sin. 

The resources of this country are vast, her spirit bold 
and daring, not easily subdued, and capable of great and 
brilliant enterprise. It is but natural then for us to place 
her in the front rank of the Sacramental Host — her stars 
pouring light on the millennial morning, while her spirit- 
waking trum'pet shall break upon the ears of slumbering 
millions. 

While we contemplate this magnificent scene, and 
behold the glorious prospect which the torch of inspiration 



89 

reveals to our wondering eyes, let us fear and tremble, 
lest we interrupt the high purposes of the Almighty, and, 
by our rebellion and obstinacy, turn away the streams of 
his munificence. We may contribute to the downfall of 
these high and towering hopes, by becoming forgetful of 
his mercy, and setting at naught his council. Are there 
not already monitory voices in the land?— Do they not 
appeal to our hearts in the touching and emphatic lan- 
guage of nature, and of truth? From oppressed and 
tortured Africa, plundered of her children, the voice of 
retribution falls thrillingly upon our ears ; its doleful 
echoes are heard in the South — they sweep mournfully 
in sullen murmurs and low cadences of sorrow from the 
distant shores of the Atlantic to the Rocky Mountains, 
swelling into harsh thunder as they pass through the 
halls of our proud Capitol, and far off climes repeat the 
ever to be lamented cry of slavery. This deep crimson 
stain must be erased from the escutcheon of our country ; 
it may have to be washed away in our best blood and in 
our bitterest tears. From the roll of our country's story 
it can never be blotted out ; there it must remain an 
everlasting drawback to her fame — a beam shorn from 
the effulgence of her clustered stars. 

A yet deeper cry comes up out of the dark shade of 
the wilderness. It is the voice of the princes of the land. 
Their proud elastic foot, no longer impresses the free 
soil. The mighty forests that had stood for ages clothed 
in grandeur and majesty, the green halls and beautiful 
bowers of their fathers have fallen before the men who 

have usurped their homes ; driven almost to the shores 

8 



90 

of the Pacific, a cruel policy if not speedily prevented, 
may yet seal their final and irrevocable doom. 

On to the west — dark Indian, westward go — 
ilnd bathe thy weary feet in rills of snow, 
Wild gushing down the Rocky Mountain's steep- 
Thence, passing onward, tarry not to weep; 
Thy tears would scorch tlie honey flowing soil — 
And deep, hke molten lead, its verdure spoil — 
For tears of wrong shall bathe the thunder's wing, 
And rouse the storm's portentous murmuring. 

And shall we not be visited for these things ? Most 
assuredly we shall. Let us then hasten, while we yet 
can do it. to redeem our character and pluck the remnant 
of a brave people from destruction. If we cannot restore 
to them their inheritance, we. can at least stay our rapa- 
cious hand ; we can insure them protection from an all 
grasping policy ; we can recommend them to t hecross, 
and bind them by its sacred influence forever to our 
hearts. Their retributory cry will then be changed into 
a song of joy, and into expressions of gratitude ; and the 
noble stock resuscitated, shall bloom again, to bless, and 
not curse, the destined Canaan of the new world. 

The blood of our countrymen, slain by infidelity and 
intemperance with their associates in profligacy, error 
and vice, lifteth another cry, high up into the heavens*] 
It calls sternly for vengeance on these offsprings of a most ' 
cruel and relentless fiend. Such enemies as these should 
find no favor, no harborage among the children of the 
pilgrims. For these sins the land mourns. While these 
are countenanced, nay, even sometimes passed by with 



i 



91 

out reproof, and, what is still worse, applauded, there is 
great cause to fear ; and although as yet no very alarming 
consequences may have been the result, such departures 
from the living God, must sooner or later, terminate 
unfavorably, leaving our country a prey to the tempest, 
that has overwhelmed in its resistless course the mightiest 
empire of the old world, — that rolled upon ill-fated 
France an avalanche of guilt and crime, and whose 
destructive influence, if not boldly and successfully 
encountered, may, ere long, bury deep in its own ruins 
the noble fabric, reared by the toils and virtues, the blood 
and prayers of the illustrious fathers of our country. 

Eloquent voices come down out of heaven to reprove 
us. They warn us of approaching evils, and call loudly 
upon us to repent in dust and ashes. Let us, then, as 
individuals, each one contribute his part to stem the tor- 
rent of corruption, to build up the waste places of Zion, 
and to oppose sin in every shape, without fear and with- 
out favor. It is high time for christians to awake, for 
the American people to arise, and clothe themselves in 
the armor of pure and undefiled religion. The enemy 
is at the door. He is forcing an entrance into our most 
sacred places. The temples of religion and the seats of 
learning are tainted with the monster's foul breath, and 
the promise and strength of our young men are bowing 
down under the wei2;ht of his relentless and withering 
arm. Beneath his iron heel the loveliest flowers of earth 
are crushed, and the beautiful buddings of virtue forever 
blasted. There is no time to be lost. And while each 



92 

for himself makes secure the foundation of his own hopes, 
let our prayers ascend for our country, that amid all the 
flashings of its brightness, it may be irradiated by the 
light of religion, blessed by the prayers of its citizens, 
worshipped with the gratitude of every patriot heart ; and 
then the return of this glorious day shall be hallowed by 
increasing associations of moral sublimity, till every beam 
shall have met in one common focus, even the salvation 
and happiness of every individual who forms a part of, and 
lives within, the boundaries of the great Republic of the 
western world. 

There can be no enthusiasm excited by this subject 
that shall seem disproportioned to the thrilling importance 
which gathers around the contemplations of this day. — ■ 
One of the noblest moral pictures of antiquity is that of 
Curtius leaping into the gulph that had yawned in the 
Roman Forum — and the patriot poet could not have 
found in the rainbow regions of fancy a more glorious 
picture than that drawn by Robert Treat Paine, which 
represents Washington standing at the portals of our 
national temple, catching, on the point of his sword, the 
lightnings of faction and guiding them harmlessly to the 
deep. But higher honors await the American patriot 
who walks around the bulwarks of our empire, lifts the 
voice of warning at every suspicious appearance, and 
moulds its highest towers to the transcendant model of 
Republican beauty and christian simplicity. Bombastic, 
inflated forms of speech, although used to surfeiting on 
the subject of our national independence, do not belong 



93 

to it any more than the gaudy coverings and silken 
frippery belong to the perfect forms of ancient statuary. 
The sublimity of circumstance and of fact is enough to 
chain the tongue to its most chastened simplicity, while 
the ardor of the grateful, distended heart burns in the 
eyes, and lends eloquence to language. 

We have alluded to infidelity, as a serpent foe m the 
midst of us — but although we warn, we do not fear. 
This serpent shall trail the dust beneath the chariot wheels 
of pure Republicanism — and a little further onward, 
chained to the millennial car, the monster's blood and 
the torn fragments of his sinous body, shall be scattered 
in the whirlwind revolutions of angry wheels. There is 
a natural land where there is no serpent. There shall 
be an entire world where no moral serpent's hiss shall 
startle innocence, or interrupt the singing of the turtle- 
dove for a thousand years. We boldly, on this day of 
national joy and independent emotion, dare the monster, 
infidelity, to do his worst to enslave the empire of free 
christian minds around us. We hav^e a bill of rights 
which we dare vindicate, and a bill of a thousand wrongs 
to thunder at the head of the infidel, while he remains 
an incorrigible one. We have a declaration of inde- 
pendence from the slavery of vile principles and moral 
pollution in the words of a greater than Jefferson. We, 
as christians, this day stand to our arms. We abjure the 
blighting breath of scepticism ; — we defy the legions of 
hell, in the name of the living God, and foresee the day 
when the sneers of the enemies of the cross shall change 
8* 



94 

to the settled, deeply -graven lines of despair — the galling 
mockery of scorn, and the burning venom of unavailing 
envy. 

Then, Christian patriot, comes your triumph ! The 
meek then shall Inherit the earth. The bat-winged 
minions of darkness shall retreat before this morning of 
moral independence; and one wide generous glow of 
radiance diffuse itself above, around the lovely and loving 
disciples of the ever-blessed Jesus. Then shall earth be 
like heaven. Then the rejoicings of this day, shall break 
out in every desert, and barren land, while the ancient 
fertility hastens back to earth, as when Adam first sung 
his morning hymn in Eden. Then the sons of God will 
shout for joy, as in the morning of the young creation. 
Then a more heavenly song than the hoarse trumpets 
breathe, or the deep-mouthed cannon utters, shall rail 
its harmonies through the vocal creation, swelling its 
solemn sweetness to every ear — ' Peace on earth, goob 



'One song employs all nations; and all cry, 
* Worthy the Iamb, for he was slain for us !' 
The dwellers in the vales and on the rocks 
Shout to each other, and the mountain tops 
From distant mountains catch the flying joy : 
Till, nation after nation taught the strain, 
Earth rolls the rapturous hosanna round. 
See Salem built, the labor of a God ! 
Bright as a sun the saci'ed city shines ; 
All kingdoms and all princes of the earth 
Flock to that light ,• the glory of all lands 
Flows into her ; unbounded is her joy. 
And endless her increase.' 



95 

GLORY. 

'Tis a stain on hill or strand, 

A flasli upon the sea, 
The gleaming of a gorgeous brand 

Through charging chivalry . • 

'Tis a flower of tearfuUeaves 

That tells of sudden death- 
While friendship o'er the fallen grieves 
And wastes elegiac breath. 

'Tis a wreath of battle smoke 
Thrown raddy up to heaven. 

What time Bellona's thunders broke 
Through clouds of sulphur riven. 

'Tis eloquence or song 
In soft — or brazen strains, 

Sweeping a thousand hearts along 
In ecstacy — or chains. 

'Tis a flash of wisdom's eye 
In council chambers bright, 
To guide a nation's destiny 

Through triumph, wane, and night. 

'Tis beauty's pearl eyed, sunht form 
On death's cold shadow gazing — 

Or rainbow arches after storm, 
In humid splendor blazing. 

'Tis death and Ufe so strongly blent 

That mortals in the strife 
Know not for whom the boon is sent 

Till they have done with Ufe. 

'Tis Cyprus, urn, and bust, 

The mausoleum of fame, 
To lend a pile of buried dust 

A never ending name. 



96 

ADVENTURES OF A CONTRIBUTION BOX. 

T am a square-built old gentleman, and have a very 
prominent member to my face which is, by many who 
have the same feature in full perfection, considered a 
sign of sagacity. I say no more about my personal ap- 
pearance, but will briefly tell what I have seen, heard, 
and what I have done. I sit in the altar at church look- 
ing anxiously around on every new face — I know all the 
old ones — and on no human being do I so imprint my coun- 
tenance as it were as on the clergyman if he is a stran- 
ger. I read the lines of his countenance, notice the 
movement of his head, and count his steps up the pulpit 
stairs, to know if he makes two steps to a stair, or two 
stairs to a step. I then count the audible beatings of his 
heart, and cast about in my mind what his message is and 
what he has come for. If he smoothes down his hair to 
prevalent fashion or adjusts it a la mode in any way, 1 
have not great hopes that he will aid me, or that I can 
be of any great benefit to him ; but if he passes his hand 
unconsciously through his hair, making it assume an erect 
and fierce position, I regard him as a workman who is 
determined for one not to be ashamed of his calling. 

I proceed to relate the proceedings of a certain Sabbath 
morning. Far and wide through the papers and in a 
previous meeting had the fame and the benevolent er- 
rand of the minister preceded his appearance. He did 
not come unawares. He did not appear in an obscure 
pulpit — nor was there a contribution box in the altar be- 
low him which had not been in good society. He was 



97 

pale ; I was glad to see it, for candidly I never knew 
much done in the pulpit by rosy cheeks. Emotion 
dwells in the pale rose not in the red. A clergyman 
who has not, before he reaches the pulpit, thought enough 
of his subject to feel its emotion resting on his spirit like 
an unseen power or influence will not expect to storm 
heaven or frighten hell on that same day. But, perhaps, 
I am out of the line of my business in making these re- 
marks — although I have a heavy interest at stake, and 
must even be permitted sometimes to preach to preach- 
ers. 

The introductory services were finished in rather a 
low, husky voice — but a sound ever and anon reached 
the very heart and sent a thrilling emotion through my 
frame like the jarring of an organ. Ah, thought I, emo- 
tion and prayer are hid in the husky volume of that low 
toned voice ! Right glad was I to be forgotten in the 
commencement of his sermon that I might be remember- 
ed, as I thought I must be, in the peroration. I like a 
wet notice. I had rather be called out into an aisle 
slippery with tears than into one radiant with smiles. I 
do not like plumes, or pokes, or ribbands in church ; al- 
though they are good creatures they should not obtain 
%c mastery and shut out from the view of mortals the 
light of heaven and the light of the messenger's counte- 
nance, and — but I am leaving my subject. The minis- 
ter rose and in about five minutes threw the toils of the 
gospel net around every living soul within the hearing of 
a voice that began to discover an intimate connexion be- 
tween itself and the attention and the passions and the 



98 

Hearts of the audience. No one had thought of the min- 
ister's figure, his eyes, his voice, or his gesture, except- 
ing my humble self, and I began to be ashamed that I 
had. The subject he had chosen — I do not like my 
phrase — his sermon was the Great Gospel itself like a 
fresh shower of rain rolling down almost without a cloud 
upon the smoking earth, while the bright sun-beams and 
the dancing rainbows came down with it. I saw the 
cloud, as I called it, coming up and expected a clap or 
two of thunder — but it never so much as shut out the sun- 
shine, while it deluged all below it. — It was all weeping 
and.no battle. 

I was glad of one thing — which was that there was an 
upright, living body within the discourse — a palpable sub- 
stance as it were which would always be remembered by 
those present so that no one who wept that morning 
would ever be ashamed of his tears if he had never wept 
before. 

I expected every m.oment that the minister would 
plead his cause as he had so nobly done that of his Lord- 
But no — no such thing. He only spoke of a woody re- 
gion, a scattered people, and no one to lead them heaven 
ward, and incidentally remarked that every one there 
knew how to relieve them as well as felt the acknow- 
ledged privilege. He ended — and, although he never 
mentioned my name, I instinctively went to my work. — 
The first person I addressed dropped his penny back 
again into his pocket and wrote a check which he gave 
me to be paid on the morrow : bank bills came to light : 
I went to the sea of waving plumes and heaving bosoms 



J 



99 

— the first bedewed me v, ith tears — the next gave me a 
ring — the next a diamond pin — and hundreds wept the 
more diat they had nothing to give — in the gallery a sailor 
gave me the last shot in his locker — another the las^ 
twist of his tobacco. 

I w^as then full. I could contain no longer. I over- 
flowed in the sight of the whole assembly. The next 
morning I read ray fame in every newspaper. 



PLAINTIVE HARP OF JUDEA. 

Oh that I had wings like a dove, 
I would fly away to my rest ! 
In the desart thick woven above, 
I would find a moss-covered nest ; — 
The wilderness, solemn with shade, 
Should shelter from storm and from wind, 
The wanderer sorrow hath made. 
And soothe with soft murmurs his mhid. 

The song of the mountain bird, lieard 
All lonely and plaintive at night, 
Is sweeter than timbrels that cheered 
The dance in the silver moonlight — 
There's more peace in the waterfall 
Than in angry shoutings of men 
Who loudly upon heaven call, 
Then go to their sinning again. 

Dark city ! how violence roams 
From thy wall to the central tower, 



100 

Ejecting the poor from their homes, 
And wreathing for wealth a bower 5 
The Sorceress skill'd to destroy, 
And Guile, with a serpent's deep art. 
The palace and cot shall annoy. 

But, afar, on the mountain top, 
Where solitude spreadeth her throne, 
Wiiere the clouds their first showers drop, 
I will bow me in prayer — alone ; 
At morning and evening and noon 
I will speak, and be heard above. 
And answered, from heaven full soon, 
With the Cherubim voice of love. 



PAIN. 

There is a lesson for man in the infliction of pain 
and sickness. These must originate in the command 
or permission of God, and we are to receive them as 
coming from his hand in a line still more direct than 
those calamities which originate in the wickedness or 
ignorance of men. Pain comes upon us as a teacher 
of humility. Earth wears no longer the thousand illu- 
sive colors of deception — the drapery which our vivid 
fancy may have woven over the deformities and taste- 
less enjoyments of the world do not float in the sunless 
atmosphere of a sick chamber. We learn what life is 
—and begin to feel what death will be. The astronomer 
who would send his farthest gaze through the deeps of i 



101 

heaven avoids the sun, and his telescope takes the altitude 
of the skies at dusky eve or in quarters adverse to the 
orb of day. Too much light near at hand obscures a 
distant view — and too much of life and the joys of health 
obscure the view to that better country reserved for the 
pure in heart. In sickness the room is darkened like 
that in which the camera obscura is located. It is 
overshadowed that, the waving trees, the rushing streams, 
the dewy meadows, the mountains and vales of a distant 
scenery shall be made visible — and the hour of sickness 
should be made the hour of looking away to the hills 
where our Redeemer has gone. As the functions of 
nature and the senses become the occasions and the 
avenues of pain, the time is favorable to ascertain if the 
mind has that culture which will give it happiness when 
flesh and sense are alike in the cold tomb. Like to a 
wandering star, travelling with dubious course from dark 
to darker spheres towards the blackness of darkness 
intense, is that intelligence which has ever relied on sense 
as the minister of its every pleasure, when sense no 
longer stands by in the warm habiliments of flesh and 
blood. On earth, such an one has received his good 
things. 



THE PARTING. 

And are the moments past, 
The loved ones flown — 

And must we part at last 
To weep alone ? 

9 



102 

Shall friendship's wreath untwine; 

Its roses fade — 
And all I once called mine 

In death be laid ? 

Yes — time hath hurtled by^ 

We part in tears. 
The wreath is sere and dry. 

No more it cheers ; 
But memory o'er the urn 

Of past joy moves, 
And speaks in words that burn 

Of those she loves. 

And we shall meet again, 

Thou wounded dove, 
Forever to remain 

In bowers above : — 
There heavenly anthems swell 

Like piping winds — 
And peace and union dwell 

In holy minds. 



AFFECTION'S LAST PROOF. 

Mr. Isaac Johnson and his accomplished wife, the lady 
Arabella, daughter of the Earl of Lincoln, emigrated to 
Salem, from Linconshire, England, in the early settle- 
ment of Massachusetts Bay. Soon after the death of 
his lady, Mr. Johnson removed to Boston, and was 
one of the first permanent residents. ' At his death he 
was buried at his own request, in part of the ground 



103 

upon Tremontain or Boston, which he had chosen for 
his lot, the square between School street and Queen 
street. He may be said to have been the idol of the 
people, for they ordered their bodies as they died, to be 
buried round him, and this was the reason of appropri- 
ating for a place of burial what is now called the old 
burying place adjoining to King's Chapel.' 

HUCTHINSON. 

There is not on record a more touching proof of 
affection than that disclosed in this short paragraph of 
New England History. It is generally considered that 
duty terminates with the close of life. But here, at least, 
there is proof of a consideration that extends to the 
dominions of death. The peculiar circumstances of the 
pilgrim lathers rendered their attachments more lasting 
and holy than most of the friendships of earth ; they 
had left the cultivated and intellectual circles of England, 
where every earthly comfort awaited them, and, ' on the 
dark new England shore,' expected nothing but priva- 
tions of bodily comfort, balanced by the magnanimous 
consideration of religious liberty, * freedom to worship 
God ;' — and thus separated from the scenes of early 
association, amidst the wild and comfortless scenes of a 
new country, what more natural than that, in life and 
death, these worthy men should cling around the leading 
stars that had guided their pilgrimage. 

Imagination lingers around the death-beds of these 
founders of a noble nation, and listens to the last mandate 
of parental authority — let my body repose near the 
beloved Johnson. What earthly crown has one half 



104 

the respect and sincerity in its motto that this dying 
request inherits. It is a tribute which the proudest 
statesmen and sages might envy. Through every 
vicissitude of earth, the waste of flesh and bones, and 
the final resurrection in which long decayed dust shall 
be raised again, to be near one in favor with God and 
man, would be pleasant — and the commitment of our 
cherished bodies to the same dust which covers a 
benefactor, is almost as much an act of the other world 
as of this — it would seem like the last deed of time and 
the first action of eternity. 



WHY SHOULD WE DIE? 

Why should we die 
Within the dark cold grave to he ? 
The world is fair and friends sincere, 
And life is sweet and home is dear ; 
Mild charity is standing by, 
And love, like nature's melody 
Through grove and brake and bower heard. 
Is true to each impassioned word ; 
A thousand ang-el voices sigh. 
And murmur sweetly — do not die. 

Why should we die, 
And^see no more the deep blue sky. 
The earth with all its garniture. 
The snow-drop in its whiteness pure. 
The red rose in the summer sun. 
The autumn foliage ripe and dun, 



105 

The blushing morning and cahn eve, 
The seas that roar, or rills that leave 
The rock to wander peacefully — 
From these — from all — why should we die = 

Why siiould we die ? 
Hope whispers with her lucid eye ! 
And brighter far than hope there comes 
One brightening all the darksome tombs— r 
One who has trod the vale of death 
And lost amidst its glooms his breath — 
He, Angel of the Covenant, now 
With crowns of glory on his brow, 
With mercy kindling in his eye. 
Says sweetly — sinner, do not die. 



FRENCH REVOLUTION. 

The wonderful doings of antiquity are wonders no 
more. Brutus, who struck at a tyrant's heart , Cato, 
who embraced the point of his own sword rather than 
compromit to a tyrant the dignity of the commonwealth; 
Tell, whose principles of mountain liberty made tyrants 
turn pale, and other names, long since given to history 
and song, must now be given to those shadows which 
time is weaving around them — for they are outdone, not 
by an individual or a few individuals, but by a whole 
people. The patriot who rises against existing government 
single handed, urges the populace to arms by the aids 
9* 



106 

of a persuasive eloquence, and, perhaps, himself strikes 
the blow that rids the world of a tyrant, to some extent 
must sustain the character of executioner as well as 
patriot, but when an entire people rises without one 
inflammatory appeal being made to their passions — and 
when, whatever blood must be shed, is shed by the many 
handed nation, majesty presides in every omnipotent act ; 
will becomes fate, and monarchs on their despotic thrones 
must bow like the rush before a, power second only to 
the Almighty's 

The French nation rose in one moment The 
Sabbath was quiet — and the streets of Paris discovered 
no unusual indications. No mortal being was dreaming 
of a storm. The ministry, the tools and panders of an 
ignorant despot, were, on that sacred day, signing the 
ordonnances of their own fate. God is higher than the 
thrones. It was His eye alone that saw a sepulchre open, 
wide and dreary, in the centre of Paris ; it was His hand 
that wrote rottenness on the throne of Charles the tenth ; 
God saw prospectively the smoke of conflict hanging 
like funeral drapery around the spires of the Louvre, of 
the Tuilleries,and the massive towers of the Notre Dame. 
But the king of the French and his five ministers at 
St. Cloud — how little dreamed they of entering, on that 
sacred morning un sanctified by them, the last week of 
their power — the great week of the revolution ! Did 
the wild spirit of Napoleon ride in the winds, and look 
through the coming storm abroad over the scene of his 
earthly glory 1 Was his imaginary form perched on the 
cannon built pyramid of Place de Vendome, rejoicing 



107 

in the downfall of a dynasty that had neither by virtue or 
crime earned a throne ? "^Ve know not ; but we know 
that many of his predictions, uttered on the lone rock 
of the Southern ocean, were fulfilled in the whirlwind, the 
storm, the eclipse of a failing despotism, and in the new 
day star of Freedom that rose over the short yet fearful 
commotion. Sunday was quiet ; Monday was a day of 
determination among the friends of liberty ; Tuesday the 
death shots began to rattle, and on Wednesday the 
clouds of battle settled heavily over the city ; the tocsin 
rung out its cry of anguish and dismay through the gloom, 
the reverberating cannon muttered solemnly of destruc- 
tion ; and night, after such a day, scarcely brought 
additional gloom. 

Among the dreadful things of the world's history, the 
stillness that reigned throughout the streets of Paris on 
Wednesday night may be numbered. The shots became 
less frequent, and, at eleven o'clock, the last echo broke 
upon the dull ear of night — then it seemed as if the 
heart of war was broken, and its last groan uttered. 

But to men accustomed to horrible scenes this still- 
ness was more dreadful than the brazen thunders of 
the day. Uncertainty hung over the destinies of France. 
Four wretched hours bounded this deathlike silence, 
and before the morning light visited the world, the tocsin, 
as if sounded by invisible beings, simultaneously, from 
one end of Paris to the other, awakened the cry of to 
arms — to arms ! This was the people's tocsin. Heavy 
sounds, the breaking up of pavements and the urging 
forward of cannon, disturbed the morning, and the 



108 

ruddy sun rose on Lafayette at the head of the old 
National Guards, raised up as by a resurrection morning, 
to the overthrow of despotism. The terrible men of 
the fauxbourgs came down — those dogs of blood that 
howled aTound the guillotine of '95. They came for 
once in a holy cause. The nation moved this day in 
its strength — and tower and palace and boulevard, one 
after another, fell into the hands of the illustrious 
Lafayette, the veteran of three revolutions, and now, 
more then ever, the saviour of beautiful France. The 
tricolor waved on the centre pavillion of the Tuilleries, 
and on the summits of Notre Dame. The work was 
done. The conflict was over. A nation was free. 
Its tyrants were weeping fugitives towards the sea shore, 
or lurking in mean habiliments of disguise through the 
provinces. 

What a lesson to tyrants ! Never let impious man 
think the mountain of his earthly power to be strong ; 
never let him forget that God is over all, and is right ab]( 
to humble the proud. A throne is but a bubble. We 
have seen it burst, leaving thin air in place of its unsub- 
stantial fabric. But there is one throne of Sapphire 
above the heavens which is established forever. There 
change cometh not. — Revolution invadeth not the 
kingdom of God. The poorest saint on earth may have 
a throne there and be a king where the proud kings of 
earth can claim no domination, no throne, no reverence, 
no name. 



i 



FAREWELL TO SUMMER. 

The Summer is over — farewell ! 

The surf of the sea is roaring, 
The winds moan low in the dell, 

Like those for the absent deploring ; 
The mountains grow russet and gray, 
For the seasons, like man, pass away. 

There's a world where winter comes not, 
Where a farewell enters never, 

Where no clouds the atmosphere blot, 
And no change our friendships sever ; 

That world is the home of the soul, 

And how swiftly it flies to its goal ! 



ANCIENT EGYPT. 

This venerable land still retains its consideration, as 
the earliest nursery of religion and the sciences. Its gran- 
deur was of a mould too solid to wear away by the 
attrition of years. Its architecture, although in ruins, 
is of gigantic proportion and enduring materials. Its 
ruins are more distinct than tho^ of later countries, and 
all have this strange national peculiarity about them — 
they are indelibly printed with characters which have, 
until recently, remained unintelligible through centuries. 



110 



1 



The vale of Egypt reaches from the ancient ruins of 
Meroe, or from the cataracts, along the course of the 
Nile until it meets and mingles with the waves of the 
Mediterranean. 

* Far off from sunburnt Meroe, 
From falling Nilus to the sea 
That beats on the Egyptian shore.' 

From the sea which once drank in the 'seven mouthed 
Nile' the majestic ruins of city after city are found up 
to the very cataracts, encumbering the vale with relics 
of departed grandeur — and the same features of archi- 
tecture, immense weight, solidity and collossal proportion* 
exist in all that remains from the prostrate pillar to the 
everduring pyramid. 

M. Jean Francois Champollion, a distinguished 
French scholar, profiting by the investigations of an 
Englishman, the late Dr. Young, whose attention had . 
previously been devoted to the same subject, seems 
destined to be the reader of the hieroglyphic volume of 
antiquity. Champollion's Precis du Systeme Hierogly- 
phique shows the victory he has gained as well as exhibits 
the hopes which stimulate him forward in his illustrious 
course of discover}^ The first achievement of Dr. 
Young, and since of Champollion, was to discover that 
the names of kings, royal names, were invariably inclosed 
in a sort of oval ring, called by Champollion a Cartouche. 
The characters within these rings signified the name 
of a kins; — and when this name had been ascertained. 



A 



Ill 

progress, of course, was gained in the work of making 
an alphabet. ChampoUion has discovered hieroglyphics 
to be of three classes or kinds, having each their distinct 
and obscure peculiarities. Greppo's valuable work, 
I now publishing in Boston, on the general subject of 
t Eg}"ptian liberature and the recent discoveries, must 
! make a valuable acquisition to our stock of knowledge , 
I and the Christian cannot but be grateful that in this age 
' of philosophizing and searching for facts, ChampoUion has 
found on the monuments and within the rolls of papyrus 
he has read, the strongest collateral proofs of the vera- 
city of the sacred records of inspiration. 



IRELANDAND AMERICA. 

AN ORIGINAL ADDRESS, 

Written for and pro7iminced by J. JV*. JMaffilt, Jr. at an Jlcademiccd 
exhibition in Portsmouth, W. H. 

From the Emerald Isle, where hearts are brave, 

And Emmet sleeps in liis patriot grave, 

The land of song, of beauty, and of soul, 

Where fancy reigns, and generous thoughts control — 

That land, where genius spreads its ample wing, 

Where liberty hath sons and poets sing — 

From Erin, loveliest of the sea girt brood 

That rise in grandeur mid the ocean flood — 



11^ 

A voice was heard that, crash'd her galling yoke, 
And the oppressor's iron power broke ; 
'Twas freedom's voice that rolled along her hills 
Imparting music to her murmuring rills, 
Bade Ossian's deathless harp again be strung, 
To thrill and echo all her vales among, 
Called up the past, the glorious record gave, 
That swept oppression 'neath oblivion's wave. 

Long, long had the foot of slavery crushed, 
The soil that with a thousand beauties^blushed — 
The garden of the world, the fairest isle 
That e'er reflected heaven's enchanting smile, 
Till proud Columbia burst her bonds away, 
And rose at once in freedom's halcyon day ; 
Asserted to the world she would be free, 
And struck the blow that gave her liberty ! 

'Twas then Columbia welcomed freely home 
The high born race of Erin doomed to roam. 
And bade the exiles sit beneath the tree 
That shadowed hearts thrice dear to liberty ; — 
They came— and when the foe impressed this soil, 
They shared with you, in blood, in sv^^eat, and toil- 
Beneatli your stars they rush'd to deadly strife, 
And struck with you for country, home and life. 

And when in later wo pale Erin wept, 
Your richest treasures o'er the Atlantic swept, 
Dropt gems of feeling on the sainted isle. — 
'Tis done — with you the merry peals arose, 
And Erin now is plucking freedom's rose — 
Her lovely mountain streams are bland and free^ 
Her fragrant winds are shouting Jubilee ! 
The roar of free born voices shake the earth. 
And bless this land of freedom's earliest birth. 



4 



113 

LOSS OF THE HORNET. 

Like hungry lions roaring 
At night-flill for their piey, 

The growhng winds are pouring 
Tlieir thunders on the bay. — 

Their thunders on the ocean — 
Their wings sweep from the land — 

Air, earth, and sea, in nnotion, 
Obey the loud command. 

Obey their loud commander 
And yell the death huzza, 
Resolved to sink or strand her, 
The war siiip on her way. — 

The war-ship on the billow 
Repeats her plaintive gun, 

Then makes the rocks her pillow— 
Her voyaging is done. — 

Done is her voyaging ; 

But sternly she went down 
With her pennons bravely flying 

And stars upon her crown. 

Her stars with honor beaming 

Lit up the deep below. 
And still her flag is streaming 

Where coral mountains grow. — 

Where rise the coral mountains 

With blooming sea-flowers dressed 
By the deep ocean fountains 
The Hornet moors at rest. 

10 



114 



THE BIBLE. 



Substance of an address, delivered in Duane-street church, JsTov.lWif 
1830, before the 'New-York District Bible Society.' 

Among all the miracles of eternal Love, there is none 
greater than the miracle of revelation. I address a 
Bible Society — a class of philanthropists banded together 
for the thrice holy purpose of spreading the holy Scrip- 
tures through the habitations of the poor — through the 
Sabbath Schools — and far distant, if Providence shall 
open the way, over the wide seas. It will not, therefore^ 
be unappropriate, to speak a few words about that wond- 
rous book of God which has remained with us till the 
present time, through all the changes of rising and falling 
empire — through vicissitude and wo — through gloom and 
sun-shine. Listen ye lovers of this sacred treasure, 
while I feebly attempt to shadow forth its immortal 
beauty and the freshness of its eternal blessings. 

Let me draw a picture of a world without a Bible. — 
But how shall I paint a world without a moral sun .^ 
Creation clouds itself in gloom. The stars sink away in 
their deep and rayless sockets— like the eyes of beauty 
quenched in death. The feeble taper of human life only 
burns and throws around it a faint halo of half visible 
illumination, disclosing only the black and heavy shadows 
around, like the walls of an impassable sepulchre, where 
the buried millions of earth await their change, which is 
only from a dubious animation to an unknown, untriedy 
echoless annihilation or suspension of being ; — ^nor need 
they wait long, for sad experience teaches them daily 



115 

that they stand like soldiers, whose ranks grow thinner 
and thinner under the blaze and storm of a battle — a 
battle in which all on both sides are slain, and no one left 
to howl a lamentation. 

Amidst earth's millions no one appears happy. No 
one knows of an hereafter with certainty. The nations 
grope in darkness — thick darkness. But suddenly a ray 
of light shoots down from heaven, like the first born light 
of the vitgin creation, and discloses wonders which had 
been hid for ages. Burning leaves of golden light follow 
each other in quick succession down from the empyrean. 
They remain with men, throwing their splendor on all 
around — while they leave, behind them, a line of living 
light which discloses a world to come — an eternity of 
happiness to the penitent beyond the dark vale of time. 

I will leave this figure to consider for a moment the 
wonderful preservation of the gift of heaven to men. — 
Passing by its preservation before the cannon of Scripture 
was completed, we look at it as it was slowly and pain- 
fully multiplied by the pen during the first centuries of 
Christianity. The Roman Church held the sacred 
volume in deposit. It was graven on parchment, and lay 
magnificently in the cloisters and cells of devotion. But, 
a storm of seven-fold fury was gathering in the north, and 
the Vandal flood, swelled by the barbarians of a thousand 
Tartar clans, came rolling down on beautiful and enerva- 
ted Italy. Art sunk beneath the thundering cataract. — 
Palace, pillar, tomb, and temple were swept from their 
ancient locations. Every thing beautiful and grand, was 
lost in the whirlpool of savage war. The Collisseum itself 



up 

scarcely stood secure, while gloriousRome, letters, oratory, 
music, poetry, refinement, all struggled a moment, and 
then sunk in the abyss of Gothic destruction. What 
hand now could save the holy Bible, when books 
perished in one universal conflagration — and the orb of 
ancient science sunk behind the hills that skirted the 
Campania ? The book of God seemed to be lost through 
the mental night which succeeded the overflowing of 
these destructive waters. But an astonishing providence 
presided over the precious bequest of the will and law of 
God. When the besom of barbarianism had swept over, 
and the world again seemed weary of ignorance, the 
Bible, buried like a strong tree by the mountain avalanche, 
shoots up again through the superincumbent ruins by its 
own native vigor, throwing up its fresh, emancipated 
branches to heaven. First, in the light of the reforma- 
tion, the Bible appeared, a flame, ever burning, yet 
unconsumed. Then followed in its train, as the thousand 
lesser stars follow the evening star, the arts, sciences, 
literature, and a part, at least, of ancient erudition. But 
the Bible came forth — first — -alone — entire. No rent 
was made in the majestic drapery of Inspiration. It was 
still the glorious thing which the martyrs hugged to their 
bosoms amidst the flames or when they were thrown to 
the wild beasts of pagan Rome. 

I will now speak of the grandeur of the sacred writings. 

Every line from Genesis to the last amen of the 
apocalypse breathes a spirit not of this world — the grand 
spirit of its author. We should be startled to see a 



117 

magnificent column rising from a desolate plain, rich with 
splendor, incased with jewels, precious stones, and the 
beauties of an indescribably grand architecture, throwmg 
itself upwards through the mist of time until on its capital 
rested the clear sun-light of immortality. Such a column, 
amidst the monuments of art and science, is the venerable 
Bible — the rich, fragrant, perfect word of God. Side by 
side with the grandest poetry, eloquence, or literature of 
the ancient or modern w^orld, the Bible transcends them 
all in the grandeur of its subject — the beautiful simplicity 
of its diction, and its unmeasured influence over the 
minds of men, as well as over their future eternal destinies. 
The Bible is the only book that shall survive the con- 
flagration of the w^orld. In some form or manner, 
unscorched by flame, its blessed leaves will be opened on 
the judgement morning. 

In another figure of speech I will call the Bible the 
siar of eternity. It has risen over the troubled waters 
of time. The feeble mariners of earth, catch its light 
over the heaving waves, and, by its pure splendors, they 
may guide their frail bark into a haven of eternal rest. 

I shall call the Bible the charter of freedom on earth. 
Where, oh, ye men of a free Republic, would have 
been your liberty^ had not Jesus said with an authority? 
earth and its kings cannot ruluse to hear. Do unto others 
as ye would have others do unto you^ 

Cannot every observer, who regards the signs of the 

times, notice the increasing influence which the code of 

inspiration is now exerting on Councils, Cabinets and 

Kings ? Has it not taught, and is it not now teaching in 

10^ - ^^ 



118 

a voice of thunder — that all men are equal as well as 
/ree? 

I shall call, in another figure of speech, the holy Bible 
the chart to conduct the soul through the valley of the 
shadow of death. It is said of the dying Napoleon, that 
when his features began to sharpen under the approaches 
of death, he ordered the bust of his far distant infant 
son to be brought and placed at the foot of his bed. Tt 
was an affectionate command. It moves a parent's heart 
to hear of it. But, oh, could the departing soldier of 
destiny only have seen the dark future before him made 
glorious and plain by the light of this chart of salva- 
tion — could he liave caught its holy illustrations flashing 
heaven and glory upon his darkening eye, he need not 
have sought earthly alleviations from earthly objects — 
nor then, would the last words of his dying delirium 
have been the commands of an earthly battle ! 

In a more affectionate and soothing phrase, I shall call 
the Bible the comfort of the poor. Softly and gently it 
lays its hand on the poor man's head — and says — son, 
be of good cheer ; thy sins may be forgiven thee ! Al- 
though a few fleeiing hours have been spent here below 
in comparative sorrow and poverty, riches, that never 
make unto themselves wings to fly away, may be yours, 
where all sighing and sorrow shall be unknown forever. 

The Bible speaks peace to the widow who mourns 
with unavailing wo the departure of her beloved from 
her arms and the light of life ! It says to her — weep 
not for the Almighty is thy husband and protector. 

The Bible is the treasure and inheritance of those 



119 

dear children who have no father and mother to watch 
over then' tender footsteps. The influence which this 
good gift of heaven is exerting over society in favor of 
suffering humanity, is even a better security for the wel- 
fare of an orphan than an immense legacy of wealth 
would be. 

The Bible is the sailor's friend on the tossing seas. It 
commands the troubled waves of his soul to be calm, 
when the horrible deep boils like a pot around, and the 
great monsters of the sea await his going down for their 
meal. It is like a sheet anchor which he heaves upward, 
and fastens beyond the clouds while his bark goes down 
to the ocean caves, the mermaid's haunts and the coral 
groves. 

The Bible is the christian's monument which we may 
raise up over the tomb of every dear, departed friend. 
We look upon its ever-during lines and read of the grand 
resurrection, when soul and body shall come together 
again, never to be rived asunder. We read its storm- 
defying, golden letters, — -Blessed are the dead which die 
in the Lord : yea, saith the spirit, from henceforth they 
shall rest from their labors. On the bloody field of 
Waterloo, more than one hfeless soldier was found with 
his immoveable head pillowed on his Bible. It is the 
soldier's friend. It is computed that five hundred pro- 
fessing christians fell on the same wild field of death. 
What must have been its comforts to them ! It is one 
of the good deeds of this Society that, through its instru- 
mentality, the blessed word of God has been translated 
into the language of the Mohawk Indians. 



120 

And now let me address this attentive audience on the 
subject of exertions in favor of this blessed charity. 
Shall the poor native of the forest reach out his brawny, 
imploring arm to you for a Bible ; and will you tell him 
that you have none for him ? Shall the poor widow, 
struggling with poverty, sitting lonely in her poverty- 
darkened apartment ask you for a Bible to carry comfort 
and consolation to her widowed heart : and will you tell 
her that you have none to give her ? 

Let every one of this audience reflect that the time is 
short in which any record of our charity can be made in 
our favor. The stream of life wafts us all towards the 
great balancing of our accounts in the eternal world. 
And then, shall the items of our pleasure bill immeasura- 
bly exceed that which we have given the Lord Jesus 
Christ in the calls of charity ? It is for us to wipe away 
the tears of sorrow by our benevolence — to cheer the 
fading earth by deeds of kindness — to swell even the 
rivers of praise that murmur through the vales of Paradise, 
by the contributions of our charitable hearts :— and may 
God add a blessing to our alms ! 



THE CONSUMPTIVE. 



It is not uncommon in certain stages of the consumption 
to have frequent dreams of the dead. The scenes of 
early youth and those companions in pleasures long 
departed, and the objects of the heart's love seem to rise 



121 

to the mind's vision in the hours of sleep with the vivid- 
ness of life. Virtuous love at this quiet, pensive moment 
of waning vitality triumphs with a refreshed energy ; and 
often, in lonely musings, the image of a ' death cold' 
lover becomes, in the power of recollection, almost palpa- 
ble to sense. 

Pale lovely wanderer of earth ! why sigh at eventide 

When golden sunlight trembling leaves the quiet mountain side, 

In haste, on purple lines upborne, to visit realms afar 

And leave its sentinel behind — a bright-eyed watcher star? 

Sure as the daylight goes away, so sure its glad return 

Shall kindle glorious fires again to cheer thee as they burn. 

Pale lovely wanderer of earth ! why midst autumnal gloom 
Walk pensively and tearfully, like those who seek the tomb ? 
Sure as the fallen leaf decays, so sure it buds again 
When April comes with mellow winds, and gusliing founts of rain ; 
The merry strains from air-wing'd birds, in ecstacy shall thrill, 
And thy lone heart with bliss the while, deep throbs of love shall fill. 

Pale lovely wanderer of earth ! why tremble at the sign 

Of friends departed near thy couch to note thy life's decline ? 

Thy being fades to bloom again in beauty's angel bower. 

Where virtue's loveliest daughters dwell, and ruin hath no power — 

Where Jesus is — thy Savior there — and there thy death cold love 

Hath summoned home his sweet Annette ; — he waits for you above. 



I 



INFIDELITY DESTROYS ITSELF. 

The short history of modern infidelity is this. — When 
the reformation had broken in upon the tyramiy of 
Rome, and the nations of Europe had spiritual freedom, 



122 

life from the death of ages, offered them by the martyrs, 
and champions of renovated Christianity, it fared well 
with those who accepted the glorious boon, and ill with 
those nations who clung the closer to the rotten hierar- 
chy of the papal church. Germany, baptized in the 
waters of salvation, hailed her most glorious days ; 
education, along with holiness, diffused immortal splen- 
dor through all the Helvetic clime. But France, second 
only to the Latin fortress of the See Apostolic, clung 
to the mitred crown and lent her strength to him who 
had, in his attributes, exalted himself above all that was 
called God. Learning no wisdom from the loss of 
kingdom after kingdom. Papacy still adhered to its 
assumption of power over earth and heaven, over hfe 
and limb, as well as over the undying soul, which the 
stern prayers of the Church tossed in its purgatorial 
sufferings, like those forbidden to rest when the torments 
of earthly penance and ghostly absolution were over. 
The natural retreat to one whose reason refused to 
swallow down the enormously distended mass of miracle 
and saint, the mingled rites of heathen worship and 
christian ceremonies, would be infidelity. Infidelity was 
born in the bosom of the Romish Church. 

The Infidels of France played with the infernal 
passions of men as with fiery serpents. The broad 
experiment was made whether earth could at once be 
turned into a hell of furious execration, and summary 
bloodshed. Heaven was to have been robbed at once 
of every expected accession from earth ; and, in contempt- 
uous mockery of the dead, the inscriptions of the 



123 

cemeteries declared that deg,th was an eternal sleep. 
The Sabbath became a decade of mirth, such as the 
Creator had never sanctioned. The shining talents, and 
learning, the wit of the age, became auxiliaries to the 
new and amazing theories of licencious systems, and 
grovelling practices. Infidels seemed amazed at the 
long bondage under which they supposed themselves 
to have been groaning — a bondage to moral precepts, 
to good order and religious principles. Awake, at 
length, they determined to enjoy their new found freedom 
and all creation opened before them where they might 
prowl, and lay rapacious hands on riches they had never 
earned, honors they had never deserved — making havoc 
of beauty, virtue, and the loveliest beings that had ever 
adorned the circles of social life and the duties of 
affection and constancy. 

The measures pursued by these fiends in human form 
to propagate their principles, or to destroy the pure, 
confiding faith of the humble christian, were ridicule, 
violence, death. Voltaire, with a perpetual sneer woven 
into the fibres of his countenance, used the artillery of 
wit, sarcasm, and ridicule to overthrow the religion and 
the name of Jesus Christ. ' Crush the wretch,' was the 
motto of infidelity, which passed like a watch-word 
from kingdom to kingdom in the darkened conclaves of 
the Illuminati. The reckless deeds of proscription, 
violence, and death were done by Danton, Robespiere, 
Marat, and the hell-hounds who licked the blood of the 
guillotine, and howled their orgies amidst death-groans, 
and the shrieks of murder. History has never had 



124 , 

crimson deep enough to paint these bloody scenes. Here, 
Modern Infidel, was thy beginning ! Here the young 
monster, abominable to earth and heaven, was baptized 
in the blood of infants, of maidens, of youths, of 
matrons, and virtuous men. Hell celebrated with her 
horrid orgies this new era of human misery, as if man 
had fallen once again from a state of wo to a deeper 
ruin. 

Too much for heaven to bear, the sin of this dreadful 
time was not permitted with impunity. Left to their own 
counsels, the millions of infidelity were for a time like 
hungry wolves that leave the sheep-fold desolate to prey 
upon each other, until few were left to howl in the 
madness and torment of their punishment. 

The terrible agony of this period humbled no one. 
Men gnashed their teeth, blasphemed against heaven 
and repented not. Foiled in its work of bloody exter- 
mination, Infidelity went into the schools and universities 
to poison the fountain of happiness. Germany, eminent 
for literature and science, was caught in the snare of 
the adversary. In the struggle for classical eminence, 
the student of the German gymnasia and universities 
were taught in their exegesis of heathen authors to 
imbibe as it were the very vitality of the writer ; they 
were to translate themselves back to the time in which 
he lived and wrote ; they were to drink in the religious 
opinions, receive his notions of mythology, and think his 
thoughts with the same eagerness of pursuit and absorbed 
mind they should have done the oracles of inspiration. 
The legitimate consequence has been that all religious 



125 

opinions, with the exception of the truth itself exerted 
an equal influence over tlie youthful mind. It soon 
became no matter whether the Deity was ' Jehovah, 
Jove, or Lord.' This is the legitimate cause, doubtless, 
of all the unsanctified literature of Germany — and 
offers no argument against education if it be sufficiently 
guarded with a salutary religious influence. It is pre- 
posterous for Christians to go back to heathenism for 
religion. German neology as well as the more bare- 
faced and unblushing infidelity of French derivation 
have deeply affected society in England and in this 
country. Iadeed,where have they not gone poisoning 
the happiness of man in time, and obscuring the glory 
of his eternity, in the same proportion that they weakened 
his responsibility and clouded over the brightness of liis 
immortality. 

Infidelity is now old enough to see that every blow, it 
has thus far struck against the sublime and av/fuUy 
venerable fabric of Christianity, has rebounded with 
accelerated momentum against its own fortress. Voltaire 
little thought that his infidel tracts would furnish the 
hint for a religious movement that should wrest every 
victory from his hands and leave him a shorn, weak, and 
blasted man, trembling on the bed of death — his name 
linked to infamy and moral deformity forever. He little 
thought that the very identical press which vomited forth 
his blasphemous scoffings should, in a few years, become 
a hallowed instrument in the hands of benevolence and 
Christian charity of diffusing light over those fields he 
was clouding with mental darkness. 
11 



125 t 

The worltl became afraid of Iniidelity under its first 
bloody type. Fear fell on the nations. Oh^ never, ne- 
ver, said they, while time wanders onward towards eter- 
nit}^ let us see the gory scenes, the he adless trunks, the 
spouting life-blood, the maniac features of a revolution 
in favor of infidelity. Never, said they, while earth adds 
page to page of her fearful history, may the startling, 
ghosts of a thousand hellish monsters again cross our 
vision — -and, never again may demons rock the cradle 
of empire with clotted fangs, or gaze on the infancy of a 
new dynasty, with burning, blood-shot eyes. 

If we mistake not, the more serpent-like, insinuating^ 
and covered infidelity of the later school is soon destined 
to become the loathing of the nations, and beget a deeper ^ 
3fe -action than even the bloody reign of terror. 



JERUSALEM OVERTHROWN 

Compassed with armies— rent with war-- 

Black with a scorching curse — 
^ What wait Jadea's milUons for, 

A better or a worse ? 
Pierced with the brazen engine beam 

Gray walls, hke storm-clouds torn, 
Their shadows cast o'er Kedron's stream 

Where Jesus went to mourn. 



127 

A city terrible — but doomed — 

Bowed — scathed — and struck with death- 
Now sees Moriah's piles illumed 

With red volcanic breath ; — 
lloWd hotly up from court to court. 

Like swelling ocean-founts, 
The lava in its fearful sport 

The golden summit mounts. 

Jerusalem — sublime in gloom — 

With lighted mountains shone. 
Brief tapers of the clammy tomb 

Which burnt — and left her lone! 
How ghastly on the Jewish eyes 

The fires of ruin glared, 
While imprecations to the skies 

A redder vengeance dared! 

But, as the blasted city fell 

Beneath the Roman plough, 
Fate's wizard sisters wove their spell 

Unbroken — even now. 
'Tvvas blood that sealed Judea's doom 

And all her towers rived ; 
The cross had dug a nation's tomlj — 

Yet the slain Lamb survived ! 



MAN OF PLEASURE. 



The man of pleasure generally disregards religion and 
affects to despise it in others. This view of a subject so 
important arises from a cause less sincere than high spirit- 
ed minds would willingly admit — it is the result, less of 



128 A 

irreligious feelings or malice against the truth than of a 
paltry spirit of imitation. One of the first lessons taught 
in the schools of fashion, is, that religion is heavy, hypocrit- 
ical, stupid, morose, and either from entire thoughtless- 
ness, or a wish to cherish a view according to such teach- 
ings, a settled course of action is entered upon, which 
permits and even authorises constructive contempt of the 
pure principles of mental happiness. It is but strict jus- 
tice to this large class of our fellow beings to believe them 
at heart of sounder principles than their exterior deport- 
ment implies. But, haply, over these reflections from 
the pen of a sincere friend to humanity no man or woman 
of pleasure may pause — and sigh to regain what has been 
lost in the vortex of a mis-named life of enjoyment. 

The balance of argument is in favor of one side of the 
question at issue, because almost every advocate for 
religion knows what the happiness of earth-born pleasure 
was as well as feels what heaven-born tranquility now 
is. The unripe youth who never trod the path of virtue 
long enough to have become a worshipper at its shrine, and 
never sincerely sought the tranquil pleasures that flow up 
from the wells of salvation before he became a dweller on 
the enchanted ground of worldliness, is incompetent to 
judge of Christianity ; while every christian can read his 
heart and sum the exact amount of its permanent happiness 
or despair, he cannot fathom the deeps of heavenly joy. 
Cultivated taste recoils from the undigested remarks which 
the worlding must of necessity make when religion is his 
theme ; science disdains the inaccuracy which distin- 
guishes such common-place observations on the hidden 



129 

things of a divine philosophy ; polished manners are put 
to the hhish by the effrontery of supposing the mighty 
dead as well as the accomplished and intellectual millions 
of the living advocates of a happy Christianity to bo 
enthusiasts, idiots, or hypocrites ; — and christians them- 
selves should ever avoid associating or identifying human 
infirmity, or intellectual weakness with the ennobling and 
heart-expanding emotion of religious happiness. 

The history of mind which belongs to the man of 
pleasure is a brief one ; its oudines may be hastily given. 
The moral and innocently upright standard of action set 
up in early youth is first weakened by doubts, and then 
destroyed by adverse deeds. A life of pleasure cannot 
be sustained without the baseness of deception. It can- 
not be carried out to its full excess without alienating the 
heart towards temperate pleasure, and moral restraints. 
It is one of the distinctive characteristics of mind to seek 
with increasing avidity what it has partly attained. Thus 
one acquisition in knowledge arms the mind with an 
increased power and sharpened avidity for a second and 
more magnificent acquirement; and one trespass on 
human or moral rights sends the hungry mind to grasp for 
more with a miser's wretchedness. 

The christian moralist meets the argument raised in 
favor of worldly pleasure, from the usual cheerfulness of 
its devotees, with an assertion that this surface of ap- 
parently innocent hilarity, and the play of the spirits arc? 
deceptive, and do not indicate the real amount of solid 
enjoyment. It is like the playful, glassy sporting of a 
laughing sea, while just below, the tremendous contortions 
of a whirlpool, which fasten themselves (o the flintv cliffs 

"11 



130 

a thousand fathoms down, are curHng in angry vehemence 
for the gallant ship that shall dance over those too smooth 
waters. 

It would be a picture too dark for our pencil were we 
required to portray the hollowness of all which sin and 
uncontrolled passion promise, and all they dress up in , 
the gorgeous colors of deception. Under the severe 
inspections of truth, whole armies of seemingly glorious 
beings w^ould resemble the haggard multitudes that pour 
from the gates of a long beleaguered and famished city ; 
famishing, indeed, for the lasting enjoyments of the heart, 
these thousands, under the pale light of torches, seek for 
food, on selfish and darkened and sterile plains. One 
picture drawn from life will be enough. A form beautiful 
enough for a seraph enters the mazy dance, and floats 
like a fragrant exhalation of grace and loveliness through 
the palpitating ranks of youthful fashion. The worship of 
this being is its own self; its enthusiastic and love-inspired 
eyes are lighted only by the glow of self admiration ; it 
would, to increase its own perfection of beauty, throw a 
shade on all around — and, that it might breathe before a 
higher assembly the intoxicating airs of a more exquisite 
elysium of flattery, would spread a mortal paleness on 
every face around — a blight of deformity or death. 
Imagine one hundred of these beings in one of those halls 
where art excludes nature, and the ravishing tones of 
music seem to breathe oblivion to human woes, and a re- 
quiem to vindictive or selfish passions, and here see each 
being regarding itself as the star of intense admiration, 
and regarding every other only as a satellite to reflect its 
own transcendant lustre, and, otherwise, of no account in 



131 

creation — and you have an idea of the true state of the 
world of pleasure. 

The shrewd man of pleasure is so well convinced of 
the justness of the estimate which Christianity puts upon 
the devotees of earthly grandeur, that he places, if possible, 
less confidence in such grades of character than the chris- 
tian does. Ask the Chesterfields of any age or country 
how much they believe in the thousands of warm and 
plausible pretensions of eternal friendship, which they 
hourly hear ; the lip curled in scorn will give the answer. 
Enviable state of human being w^here the rich robes of 
splendor veil only aching bosoms — where kisses only 
betray — and volumes of honeyed phraseology are thrown 
out by treacherous tongues, and not believed by a single 
listener ! 

But heavier charges rest against the man of pleasure 
than that he is unhappy and insincere. The worship of 
the God of this world is not without its thousands of 
victims offered up in the freshness of youth, and lost to 
honor, sincerity and eternal life. Were I to count the 
possessions of a professed man of pleasure, I would say 
the villa embowered with shrubbery, the willow and the, 
pride of India, is his — the rooms of state are his — the 
soft lascivious lute and harp and viol are his — the crimson 
curtains that blush around guilty scenes — the imposing 
trappings of royality are too often his own. But he has 
other tenements. The slave ship, freighted deep with 
human woe, is his — the lazar house — the sepulchral 
hospital — the low-vaulted prison — the house of infamy — 
the storm invaded cottage, the wretched abode of groans 
and hopeless want — the house of the widow when her only 



132 

daughier's purity is for ever lost, and her only son ascends 
the gallows — the gamester's hell is his, and deeper prisons 
of final wo. 

The splendor of such a view is overbalanced by its 
wretchedness. Two thirds of the noisesome graves that 
pierce the maternal bosom of the earth, belong to the 
pleasure grounds of the infidel and the debauchee. The 
scorpion remorse that rears its snaky head in the twilight 
of eternity, is his — the trumpets of war are his— the 
duellists' pistol — the suicide's poison, and the raven that 
flaps a heavy wing over doleful scenes of ruin and decay. 
No Vv-onder that ancient philosophy revered a purer 
morality than Epicurus taught, and no wonder that in 
every sanctuary in our land prayer is made for those 
whose feet are wandering in forbidden paths, along the 
Stygian stream of moral death. Philanthropy, sweet 
angel of life, visits the dark house of the man of pleasure, 
and begs for dear heaven's sake, the very wretched rem- 
nants of worn out lives. Oh, hov/ happy, if these 
wrecks of humanity may float at last in the heavenly seas 
of peace — where the hov^ding v/inds shall never ask for 
prey, and ruin never mock at mental agony. 



I 



STAR IN THE EAST. 

Niolit fj.ir^g; a sable stole o'er Bethlehem 

, On which, as on a velvet ground, each gem, 

Strov/n beautiful and grand, lay glorious there ; — 

And yet was seen, embosomed in the air, 
One star to astrologic lore unknov;n, 
Tbnclike a flame of love on midnight's ocean shone ! 



133 

Low o'er Olivet's trembling outline hung 

This new-born flame, whence milder splendors sprung 
Than ever flooded heaven or silvered earth ; 

Hail thou, bright herald of my Savior's birth ! 
Were every golden urn of Vesper dim, 
Tljy gushing fount of light would roll its waves to Him ! 

Now heaving up the skies — an eye of love, 

The magi saw the wonder roll above 
The arc where constellations gambol wild — 

They saw — and knew that Heaven's great monarch smiled, 
And took their jewelled gifts in haste to crown 
The kingly head that drew such rays of glory down ! 

On Bethlehem's manger low, the radiance glowed 
With ten fold beauty as a Babe it showed — 

'Twas Christ— Creator and Redeemer— there 
Nursed by the virgin in a straw-built lair ; 

Oh, let my contrite soul with wise men bow 

To Him who died for me — yet Uves in glory now. 



THE MOUNT OF OLIVES. 

There in dark bowers embosomed, Jesus flings 
His hand celestial o'er prophetic strings ; 
Displays his purple robe, his bosom gory, 
His crown of thorns, his cross, his future glory; — 
And while the group, each hallowed accent gleaning. 
On pilgrim staflf, in pensive posture leaning — 
Their reverend beards that sweep their bosoms, wet 
With the chill dews of shady Olivet — 
Wonder and weep, they pour the song of sorrow. 
With their loved Lord, whose death shall shroud the morrow. 

PierponVs Mrs of Palestine, 



134 

The scenery of Palestine Is alive with holy recollections. 
The modern traveller, at this distance of time from the 
date ol the grand transactions which have rendered Judea 
a land of sacred classics forever, can scarcely place his 
foot where there is not a fragrance exhaling from ancient 
story connected with the dust, the rocks, the hills, vales 
and tombs of the land of Canaan. So striking is the face 
of nature now, that the mind is lost In wonder in striving 
to conceive the glorious appearance of the country, when 
It was emphatically the glory of all lands — when the hills 
were green to the summits, the vales warm and irriguous, 
and the tops of the elevations crow^ned with fortresses 
and batdements that frowned defiance to the invader. — 
But Jerusalem Itself, with Its temple-crested mountain, 
and the scenery around It, may be supposed the diadem 
of beauty, sublimity and strength to the whole country. 
In Croly's lively pencIHngs we give the outlines of the 
temple as it rose on the adoring eyes of the chosen nation. 
* I see the court of the Gentiles circling the whole ; a 
fortress of the whitest marble, with Its wall rising six 
hundred feet from the valley ; Its kingly entrance, worthy 
of the fame of Solomon ; Its innumerable and stately 
dwellings for the priests and officers of the temple, and 
above them, glittering like a succession of diadems, those 
alabaster porticos and colonades, in which the chiefs and 
sages ot Jerusalem sat teaching the people, or walked, 
breathing the pure air and gazing on the grandeur of a 
landscape, which swept the whole amphitheatre of the 
mountains. I see, rising above this, stupendous boundary, 
the court of the Jewish women, separated by its porphyry 
pillars and richly sculptured wall ; above this, the separated 



135 



court of the men ; still higher, the court of the priests; and 
highest, the crowning splendor of all, the central temple, 
the place of the sanctuary and of the Holy of Holies 
covered with plates of gold, its roof planted with lofty 
spear heads of gold, the most precious marbles and metalb 
every where flasliing back the day till Mount Moriali 
stood forth to the eye of the stranger approaching Jeru- 
salem, what it had so often been described by its bards 
and people, a mountain of snoiv, studded toith jewels ! 

But a litde way from this glorious mountain, eastward 
over the valley of Jehoshaphat through which Cedron 
flows, is the Mount of Olives, now a lonely place, w^ierc 
contemplation loves to dwell and muse on two events in 
our Savior's life which have consecrated its scenery — 
the mental agony in the garden, and his final ascension 
from the earth. Of the first named incident the evan- 
gelists speak in tones of sorrow — and, although Jesus 
ascended into heaven to prepare mansions for all his 
followers, the elevated and original Bossuet speaks thus 
despondingly of his separation from the church : — ' but 
she has only heard his enchanting voice, she has only 
enjoyed his mild and engaging presence for a moment. 
Suddenly he has taken to flight with a rapid course, and, 
swifter than the fawn of a hind, has ascended to the 
hidiest mountains. Like a desolate wife the church has 

o 

done nofliing but groan, and the song of the forsaken 
turfle is in her mouth ; in short she is a stranger and a 
wanderer upon the earth.' 

The Mount of Olives, even now shaded in part by 
the tree from whence it derives its name, is situated 
to the east of Jerusalem, from which it is separated by 



136 

the brook Cedron and the valley of Jehoshaphat. The 
garden of Gethsemane lies over the brook on the accli- 
vity of the mountain. As the traveller approaches Jeru- 
salem through the village of Jeremiah, Olivet bursts upon 
his sight along with Moriah and Zion. It has three 
eminences or summits, one of which stretches away to a 
Sabbath day's journey from Jerusalem. It was in this 
elevation that King David three thousand years ago went 
weeping when Absalom's rebellion forced him to abdicate 
his throne for a season ; and from its elevation Jesus 
beheld and wept over the devoted city. 

We close this article with a few extracts from the 
journal of the lamented missionary to Palestine, Fisk, 
who, with his friends, Parsons, King and Wolff, frequent- 
ly repaired to Olivet to gaze on Jerusalem and ponder 
on the sublime and melancholy associations connected 
with its scenery. ' We made our first visit to Mount 
Olivet, and there bowed before him, who, from thence, 
ascended to glory, and sat down on the right hand of 
the majesty on high. There we held our first monthly 
concert of prayer in the holy land. There is no doubt 
that this is the mount from which the Mediator ascended 
to his Father and to our Father. On this interesting 
spot, with Jerusalem before us, and on this interesting 
day, when thousands of christians are praying for Zion, 
it was delightful to mingle our petitions with theirs, and 
pray for our friends, for ministers, and churches, for 
missionaries and the world. From this Mount we have 
a view of the Dead Sea where Sodom and Gomorrah 
stood, and the mountains beyond Jordan from which 
Moses beheld, in distant prospect, the promised land. 



137 

With some olive branches from Olivet, and some 
flowers from the mansion house of Lazarus in our hands, 
we returned by a winding w^ay around the south of 
Mount Ohvet, till we came to the brook Cedron, where 
it enters the valley of Jehoshaphat. This valley seems 
like a frightful chasm in the earth, and when you stand 
in it, and see Mount Zion and Moriah towering above it 
with steep hills and precipices, on your right hand and 
left, you can easily feel the force of those sublime pas- 
sages in the prophet Joel, in which the heathen are 
represented, as being gaihered together to be judged. — 
The prophet seems to represent tlie Almighty as sitting 
in his holy temple, or on the summit of Zion to judge 
the multitudes in the valley beneath him ; and there 
executing his judgements, while the sun and moon are 
darkened and the stars withdraw their shining, and Jeho- 
vah roars out of Zion, and utters his voice from Jerusalem, 
and the heavens and the earth shake ; and it is thus made 
manifest to the confusion of idolaters, and to the joy of 
the true Israel that God dwells in Zion, his holy moun- 
tain, and is the hope of his people, and the strength of 
his children of Israel. 



PASSAGE OF THE RED SEA. 

The miracles of the first dispensation of Christianity 
were called for by the stupidity of mankind. The sys- 
tematic course of nature lulls the mind to sleep, and the 
12 



138 

being who is hourly conversant with wonders quite 
astonishing as any miracle could be, accustomed to the 
frequency and regularity of their recurrence, learns to 
regard them as the necessary order of events — and, 
therefore, not surprising. On this rock Infidelity has 
made desolate shipwrecks. The Infidel has disbelieved 
the bible account of miracles, simply because the laws of 
nature were abrogated by such occurrences ; when, in 
fact, to the eye of the reflecting philosopher, the uniform 
course of nature, according, day after day as well as 
century after century, with known principles of being 
and motion, is a standing miracle, transcendently more 
incomprehensible than any occasional and startling devi- 
ation. But all mankind were not philosophers and 
became insensible to the hourly mysteries of nature and 
of their own being — and their Father in heaven, for 
great moral purposes, ordered, from time to time, certain 
innovations to rouse them to a perception of a present 
deity. 

The miraculous cleaving of the Red Sea, its walls of 
waters on either hand of the dry passage like ramparts, 
and their ruinous junction, after the chosen people had 
passed through, afford a picture of sublimity unequalled 
on the canvass that heaves with the grandest scenes of 
time ; yet no single miracle on record has been so 
obstinately ascribed to natural causes as this. The truth 
of the passage of a fugitive nation safely over this sea, 
and the destruction of their followers stands on a basis 
broader than that of the Pyramids. ' 

The site of this event has been pointed out from the 



139 

day of its occurrence to the present — and, in Napoleon's 
expedition to the Nile, in the early period of his military 
career, as Lockhart relates, it was near being the scene 
of another catastrophe that might have had an important 
influence on the destinies of the world. Towards evening, 
Napoleon and his suite rode into the shallow waters of 
the Red Sea at the reputed spot of Pharoah's overthrow, 
desirous of ascertaining to what extent they were fordable 
to their horses. Darkness was gathering, when suddenly 
the tides, there extremely rapid, were upon them, and 
the horses found themselves beyond their depth. The 
point of compass was lost, the shore was not visible, and 
a council of war was instantly called to decide on mea- 
sures for escape. Napoleon, by one of those decisions 
of mind so frequently useful to him in the future emer- 
gencies of his eventful life, ordered a circle to be formed 
and each horseman to ride from it as a radius from a 
centre, stopping when the depth of water prevented 
further progress. The next movement was for all to 
follow the horseman that rode on the farthest, showing 
the longest path of shoal water — and this w^as Napoleon's 
path from the grave of one of the Pharoahs. 

The story of this catastrophe of Pharoah is not desti- 
tute of deep moral instruction. The unyielding character 
of man, when roused up to take decisive positions, is well 
illustrated in the entire history of the Egyptian plagues. 
The nature of the greater part of these calamities was 
such as would scarcely permit them to be referred to 
natural causes. They had all been threatened as warn- 
ings to the proud king to favor the oppressed people of 



140 

the Lord; these warnings were unheeded, and the 
judgments came. Every time the impious monarch 
arrayed himself against his Maker, he had failed. He 
had seen the prophet raise in his hand the rod which he 
had turned into a serpent, and smite the waters — the 
waters turned into blood ; he had seen frogs cover the 
land, and invade his bed chambers ; he had seen the 
dust of the earth become a loathsome animation ; he had 

• seen the air burdened with flies ; he had seen the cattle 
of his plains afflicted ; he had seen his people affected 
with a disease in common with every living thing ; he 
had seen the atmosphere gather blackness, and when 
the appalling thunder broke in the gloom, hail mingled 
with fierce flames smote upon the vales of Egypt ; he 

' had seen locusts in countless millions swarm on his coasts, 
and leave no green thing behind them ; he had seen and 
felt the Stygian darkness that lay like a dreadful incubus 
over all his land — a blackness alike impervious to the 
sun's bright ray, or the glare of earthly fires ; he had 
heard the melancholy midnight cry arise from one 
extremity of his realm to the other as the angel of death 
struck the pitiless blow on every first born — and yet, 
even then, he barely consents to let this people go. 

Ten times warned and punished, who would have 
thought that the plains of Egypt would have gleamed far 
and wide with martial array, and that vengeance should 
have put on its cruel trappings to sweep from the earth a 
long afflicted, enslaved people ! The circumstances of 
the chosen people, the gathering wrath of their pursuers 
—the Red Sea with its multitudinous waves before, and 



m 



141 

the rough waves of plumes, of spears, and chariots and 
archers behind, and the passage through the parted 
billows, are well described in an unfinished poem of the 
late elegant and pious Bishop Heber of India. The 
ibllowing is a brief extract ; 

Friend of the poor! the poor and friendless save — 

oriver and Lord of freedom I help the slave. 

North, south, and west, the sandy whirlwinds fly, 

The circling pale of Egypt's chivalry, 

On earth's last niargin throng the weeping train, 

Their cloudy guide moves on — and must we swim th« main ? 

Mid the light spray their snorting camels stood, 

Nor bath'd a fetlock in the nauseous flood. 

He comes — thieir leader comes — the man of God, 

O'er the wide waters lifts his mighty rod, 

And onv'-ard treads ^ the circfing waves retreat, 

In hoatse, deed murmurs, from his holy feet ; 

And tlie chafed surges, only roaring show. 

The hard wet sand, and coral hills below, 

With limbs that falter, and with hearts that swell, 

Down, dowii they pass, a steep and slippery dell : 

Round them arise, in pristine chaos hurl'd, 

The ancient rocks, the secrets of the world ; 

And flowers that blush beneath the ocean green ; 

And caves, the sea-calf's low roofed haunts are seen, 

Down, safely down the narrow pass they tread, 

The seething waters storm above their head ; 

While far behind retires the sinking day, 

And fades on Edom's hills its latest ray. 

Yet not from Israel fled the friendly light. 

Or dark to them, or cheerless came the night-, 

Still in the van along that dreadful road, 

Blazed broad and fierce the brandished torch of God ; 

Its meteor glare a tenfold lustre gave 

On the long mirror of the rosy wave< 

12* 



142 

WASHINGTON AT THE DELAWARE. 

A winter's night with cloud and wind, 
Hung gloomy on the Delaware, — 
No watch-fire shone on Jersey shore, 
Nor trod the sentry soldier there ; 
Tiiat sound might be icy rush 
Of geUd waters sweeping by ; 
That deep toned echo in the blast 
Might be the owlet's forage cry — ' 
For man in dreamy slumbers blest 
Had long his grateful pillow prest. 

The stirring, dipping, muffled strokes 
That swept along the cloud or wave 
Might be the phanthom winds at play 
As when they leave iEolus' cave — 
But, mounted on the Jersey shore, 
Half seen through gloom, he must be man. 
Or spirit, on a war-house throned. 
Like one who leads the battle van — 
'Tis one who leads the battle on. 
The Patriot soldier, Washington ! 

An army from the frosty flood, 
Like spectres into column drawn, 
Awaits, the wild hurra of death 
When morn shall lift its sullen dawn ; 
Dark wheels beneath the cannon bent 
Roll dreary on the crusty snow — 
That snow shall redden with the morn, 
_^ And sheet the icy dead below, — 
For, like an orb of blood at even, 
The warning sun discolored heaven. 

Hope, as the day- dawn struck the hills, 
Had Ughted up the Chieftain's eye, — 



143 

Fair Trenton heard histluinder peal, 
And saw his charging eavahy ; 
Wo tlien to Hesse's sleeping ranks, 
Harsh hail-stones swept their tents away, 
The battle fires, the chills of death, 
Grew bright — then marble oold, that day,- 
And rude hands pulled the standards down 
That wav:d for En^-land's haughty crown. 



THE COMING OF CHRIST. 

For thus saith the Lord of Hosts ; yet once, it is a little while, and I will shake 
the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land j And I will shake all 
nations, and the Desire of all nations shall come : and I will fill this house with 
glory, saith the Lord of Hosts.— Hag^gai ii. 6-8. 

First — The commotions in the world subsequent to 
the appearance of the Messiah were literal. No meta- 
phor was intended by prophecy in this instance. The 
great movement here foretold commenced in less than 
200 years after the utterance of this passage. The 
conquest of Babylon by Cyrus opened the Drama. Then 
followed the conquest of Greece by Alexander — then 
the Persain monarchy was swallowed up in the whirlpool 
of Alexander's victories. Soon, however, under this 
warrior's four successors, the great Syro-Grecian empire 
melted away before the stern generals of Rome. The 
earth bowed before the conquering eagles of the seven- 
hilled city ; every nation became, in its turn, a component 
part of the magnificent republic just putting on the mantle 
of royalty, the imperial purple. Then the temple of 



144 

Janus was closed. War shook the earth no more. Every 
heart was enlarged with the expectation of a blessing 
more exalted than earth could afford. 

The Jewish nation had not been exempted from the 
general tumult. The soldiers of the holy land shared 
in those convulsive throes of battle that covered the earth 
with blood, rapine and terror ; but they still, to a great 
extent, held on to their nationality, supported by their 
mountain positions, and, more than all, by the promise 
of God, given through the departing Jacob's words, that 
the sceptre should not depart from Judah nor the law- 
giver from between his feet until Shiloh came. Less 
than any other nation was the Jewish people subsidized 
or crushed by the Roman yoke, when in one of the 
provinces a babe was born, who was to rule the Great 
Rome itself, and make the blessings of a new and pecuhar 
kingdom, unlike earthly power, co-extensive with the 
years of time added to the unmeasured units of eternity. 

Second. — The religions of the world — the fabrics of 
opinion were shaken. The ancientbeauty of the Jewish 
ceremonials, all glorious as they had been, was on the 
decay — like the stars of night that wane as the god of 
day approaches in the blushes of the morning. The 
Shekinah was dull in the holiest of holies, and gave no 
responses from heaven. A pride, equalled only by the 
cloud of selfish ignorance, hung over the minds of the 
descendants of seers, elders, priests and kings, and the 
once undivided faith of Israel was now rent into factions, 
sects, or fierce clans that would have devoured each 
other from the earth if power had only equalled their 
mutual hate. 



145 

The pagan philosophers had worn themselves out in 
their fruitless search after the universal good. Their 
theories had multiplied like the devv-droj)s of the morn- 
ing. Heathen mythology, as affording any views of 
futurity, or any system of faith or morals, haa ^been 
exploded by the action of the philosophic Grecian mind. 
Socrates, the brightest light in the gentile world, had 
reasoned deeply into the mysteries of human nature, 
had seen the bewildering errors of the schools — reached 
out his supplicating hand for a superhuman helper, and 
almost repeated the prophecy of the men of God when 
he predicted that one should be revealed, who, through 
suffering, should dictate to man the path of virtue. Morals 
and public virtue were low in consequence of the doubt- 
ing and unsettled state of the public mind. Temples 
were deserted. The oracles were dumb. Heavenward 
was every expectation turned for a new dispensation and 
for a mental light to irradiate the thick darkness of a 
world. 

Third. — The coming of the desire of all nations, 
here predicted, is rendered most strikingly significant by 
the phrase applied to him. 

Desire of all nations — because the expectation had 
gone abroad from the cataracts of the Nile to the pillars 
of Hercules that a great personage was about to appear 
and act an indescribably grand part on the theatre of the 
earth. Josephus, Tacitus and Seutonius testify that a 
rumor went through the Roman empire, awakening alarm 
and jealousy, that this universal king was to arise in Jewry. 

Desire of all nations — because all nations sought wis- 



146 

dom and light. Thus Christ is called the light of the 
Genliles. 

Desire of all nations — because in his person he was 
beautiful, the likeness of his Father's glory, fairest among 
ten thousand, the one altogether lovely, the one whose 
errand was benevolence — whose advent was love. 

Desire of all nations — because of the offices with which 
he was invested, the Savior of man from the tyranny 
of sin, the link between heaven and earth, the days man 
to bear our burdens and taste the bitterness of our doom, 
the good physician to heal when mortal skill is of no 
avail, the prophet to teach the heart the mysteries of 
perpetual love, the king to rule with a sceptre of mercy 
and then to make all his subjects the partners of his 
kingdom and the sharers of his throne, the priest to offer 
sacrifice and make intercession for us where flesh cannot 
stand before the burning throne. 

Desire of all nations — because of the structure of the 
human mind which universally feels its need of something 
more than earth can bestow, because of the anxieties 
which throb in every bosom, the endless reachings of 
thought, the unsatisfying researches of the learned, the 
pantings after immortality, — all teach that the ' Desire' 
of the human heart must be satisfied from God and from 
the living fountain opened by the toils and dying labors 
of Calvary. 

Fourth. — The object for which the Desire of all nations 
came was to fill this house with glory. It was to fill the 
Jewish temple with his presence. It was to fill, spirit- 
ually, the dark heart of man, the temple of the Holy 



147 

Comforter, with uncreated light and the solemn ant 
delightful emotions of never-ending praises. It was to 
fill, evangelically, the wide world with the splendors of 
holiness, for the whole miiverse is God's temple. It was 
to i)romulgate a glorious code of doctrines and precepts 
such as the wisest sages of earth and the long line of the 
children of philosophy had never even thought of, full 
of his own perfection, and bright with his own mentiil 
glory. It was to throw backward on prophecy the splendor 
of fulfilment, and forward on eternity the full blaze of 
the doctrines of the resurrection. 

Fifth. — In the application we find a beautiful analogy 
between this subject and the method in which Christianity 
is propagated in the heart of an individual. Worldly 
hopes, enjoyments, and all the bright prospects of earth 
are first shaken ; then with a bitter conviction of the 
instability and deficiency of human hopes, the desire 
of all nations is cordially welcomed to the soul. He 
enlightens, renovates, saves. Heaven has consecrated 
a way of approach for the penitent millions of mankind 
to other joys than those of time, and other glories than 
those of a fading world. A shining pathway is -broken 
up from the murky atmosphere of earth to the higher 
region of uncreated and perpetual sunshine. Heaven 
has sanctified human nature by connecting it with divinity. 
Christ has entered deeply into a sympathy for the woes 
of humanity, and has, himself, tasted every cup of earthly 
sorrow. 

An evangelical hope is embosomed in the amplitude 
of this subject. The shaking of nations at the present 



k 



148 

time, betokens an enlargement of the truth. The refuges 
of lies break up. The hopes of the infidel fail. The 
cold and formal churches are coming into motion. The 
long hardened Jews shake off the unbelief of black and i 
peeled centuries. The thrones of despots who would i 
bind the human mind in chains of frozen ignorance, are i 
shaken as with a whirlwind, and strange voices speak in i 
the stilly night of the blood which is found in the skirts - 
of the papal church. There is, gathered from all these 3 
signs — these signals of earth and heaven — a demonstra- ■ 
tion approaching to absolute certainty, and that certainty ' 
strengthened by the immutability of prophecy, that a i 
great moral revolution is at hand — that the light which 1 
our missionaries bear to foreign lands and the heathen 1 
wilds is coming back again in reflected radiance to the 3 
sainted circles of our churches, the domestic ahars of our r 
land — and even once holy and beautiful Palestine may/ 
soon bloom again as when Moriah threw to heaven the.^ 
new-born glories of the first temple. 



ASYLUM FOR OPPRESSED HUMANITY. 

There is a consideration connected with the history; 
of the United States which should command the grati-' 
tude of every American. It is the fact that hitherward 
the poor and oppressed of all nations are wending their 
way. Spread the map of the world in any part of the 



149 

earth and ask the inhabitants to point you out that spot 
where liberty, and plenty, and equality are enjoyed in 
the greatest measures, and the finger will ever point to 
happy America. Other countries have their advanta- 
ges ; some are more favorable for the higher acquisitions 
of science and the more generous patronage of literature 
and the arts ; others afford the w^ealthy particular dis- 
tinctions, and honors may be purchased like the market 
commodities ; and others still may hold out greater 
inducements to the tourist, the antiquarian and historian, 
who love to linger over storied scenes, and muse along 
the path of departed empires. But of all lands, free- 
dom hath chosen this as her peculiar seat — the throne 
from which to dispense her equal blessings. 

The thousands who yearly cross the Atlantic to make 
America their home and the country of their children, 
and the facility with which they mingle in the mass of 
our citizens and sustain our blood-bought institutions, 
are subjects of the most pleasing philanthropic contem- 
plation. They come from the banks of the Danube, 
from the hills of Savoy, from the Emerald Isle, from 
classic Scotland, from the manufactories of Manchester, 
and from merry France, and bring with them the arts 
and industry of the lands from whence they came — and 
if, perchance, they may bring the vices of the old world 
with them, they find themselves here beyond the influence 
of the glowing excitements to crime which abound in 
ancient communities. When once scattered throughout 
our salubrious country, with competence following every 
stroke of the hammer or the spade, the motives to dis- 
13 



150 

honest practices grow too weak to influence men who 
feel, after a very brief sojourn in this land of their adop- 
tion, that they have reached an asylum where want may 
never assail thera or their children, and hunger never 
look in at their windows. 

It is an interesting reflection which may be made in 
the streets of this city almost any day in the year as the 
Swiss emigrant, in his gi'otesque habiliments, followed 
by his wife and children, passes along in his journey to 
the far west— that those flaxen-headed urchins may one 
day be found in the senate and councils of the nation — 
and that little eye of Helvetic fire now gazing wildly on 
the first city of the new world, may one day hold in its 
eager vision the sufl^rages of millions and the consulate 
of a nation of freemen. 

Those reasoners who would preserve the pilgrim stock 
unmingled with foreign blood scarcely know to what 
point their arguments would centre. We want not the 
patrician blood of Venice to propel the central move- 
ments of our republic. Our safety must ever consist in 
a perpetual inroad upon the territories of caste, and 
pedigree. Virtue must be our sovereign-— not blood ; 
and the more Europe or Asia shall send over to us to 
earn their bread with us and learn the great doctrines 
and duties of self-government with us, the less the danger 
of hereditary power and family influence. It is thus 
we reap the harvest of the earth, gathering strength 
from the weakness ol other nations, iood from their 
famine, consolidation from their disruption — and should 
every source of European intelligence be cut ofl*, we 



151 

could read of struggles, of increasing sufferings, of 
kingdoms breaking up, as we beheld the increasing 
emigration of the miserable, and those who fled Irom 
war * as doves to their windows' towards this last asylum 
for oppressed humanity. 



NAPOLEON. 



Napoleon was, we had almost said, an anomaly among 
mankind. Splendor, energy, fearlessness and forecast 
met in union, and lent a method and a glory to what often 
might have seemed naked, uncalculating exertions of 
desperate power. But the eulogists of Napoleon have 
sought in vain to find in the elements of their hero's 
mental composiiion die unerring pledges of his vast suc- 
cess. Men as brave, as decided, as stern, as terrible, as 
selfish, may have been — and yet their names have never 
gathered a lurid brightness from the conflagration of a 
hundred cities, nor have been thundered into an immortal 
memory by the roar of a hundred batdes. It is more 
philosophically natural to regard Napoleon as a peculiar 
concentration of power and terror and success — the 
production of a peculiar era — the incarnation of the spirit 
of a period that may never return again. It confers 
a deserved honor on the administration of die moral 
Governor of the world to diink and speak of Napoleon 
as only an instrument to effect judgments strangely ter- 



152 

rible, and to scatter the accumulations of ancient art and 
hoary crime to the four winds. The late President 
Dwight of Yale College regarded the era of his dynasty 
as comprehending the period during which the sixth and 
seventh vials of the apocalyptic vision were poured out. 
This view, if correct, reveals the secret of his unexam- 
pled displays of successful power. 

If true that the almost universal convulsions which 
occurred between the years 1792 and 1815 constituted 
the great battle when the birds of the air were invited 
to feast on the flesh of kings and of captains and of mighty 
men, — then it is easy to decypher the sentences in which 
his grandeur was written. Armageddon, the mount of 
mourning, is, with murh propriety, the prophetic scene 
of the dreadful contest. An unusual number of kings, 
and nearly all the feudal nobility and men of highest rank, 
connected with royal blood of every country in Europe 
were immediately engaged in the sanguinary battles — 
and the harvest of death gathered in at Waterloo, the 
closing scene of the bloodiest drama ever enacted on 
earth, awakened groans and lamentations for their slain 
throughout the noblest families on earth. There is, indeed, 
more relief in this view of the subject to the character of 
the mighty man who stood without fear as the instrument 
of the great King of Eternity, to roll the tempest of war 
seemingly where he chose ; in this view there is a deeper 
import to eacli daring project than the mere impulses of 
ambition might have imparted ; the agent, all unconscious 
as he may have been, was honored and protected by his 
mission ; — and the Lord of Hosts, with unseen, but pow- 



153 

crful influences, girded the ' soldier of destiny' for the 
necessary but cruel work of destruction. 

The details of Napoleon's eventful life have been so 
often embodied for the public eye we cannot hope to 
awaken a deep interest in presenting once again an outline 
of his fearful path ; but we may be excused by indulgent 
readers in giving a very general sketch of the grand epochs 
of his history, making brevity atone for the deficiency of 
anecdote and circumstantial description. 

The ' soldier of destiny' was born in the island oi 
Corsica, and derived his being from an ancient Neapolitan 
family, although of decayed circumstances and waning 
honors. Early discovering an inclination for the game 
of war. Napoleon Buonaparte received a military educa- 
tion in the schools of Brienne and Paris, and, with the 
commission of a Lieutenant, first saw active service in 
Corsica in the year 1693. Soon after, through the 
influence of a Parisian friend, he was promoted to the 
command of the Artillery department at the siege of 
Toulon. Here he was received coldly by the inflated 
commander of the French army, and, after being told 
that he had no need of his services, was reluctantly 
admitted to a share of the comrnancjant's honors. The 
event proved that the whole of the honors fell to the 
share of Napoleon. His masterly arrangements, his 
triumph over obstacles, and the unrelenting coolness with 
which he swept the streets of Toulon with the storm of 
his iron hail, scarcely harder than his heart was even 
then, showed the world that the elements of his mind 

were fitted to the tempest, and that he was destined for 
13* 



154 

future distinction. As a reward for his good conduct at 
Toulon he was promoted at Nice to the station of chief 
of Battalion. But on the 28th of July, 1794, he was 
arrested and deprived of his command in consequence 
of the fall of Robespierre, with whose party it appears 
he was erroneously classed, as his intimacy was only with 
a young brother of the Robespierre family, and not with 
the gory revolutionary leader. This event threw Napo- 
leon into a temporary obscurity. He retired to Marseilles 
and lived with a part of his father's family. 

In 1775 he came to Paris in search of employment, 
and was reduced to various extremities of want while he 
unsuccessfully wooed the goddess of fortune. At length, 
the horrible scenes of intestine violence, acted over day 
after day in Paris, brought his services into requisition; 
he was recommended to the Convention as one who 
would not hesitate about trifles in carrying their decrees 
into effect by force of arras. He achieved their bidding 
in his peculiarly decisive manner — and, in spite of his 
extreme youth, acceded to the command of the aimy of 
the Interior. It was at this period of his life that he was 
united in marriage with the accomplished and ever faithful 
Josephine de Beauharnois. The command of the army 
of Italy was his next post of honor which he emblazoned 
with the splendors of success. He was triumphant -in 
the battles of Monte Notte — Millessimo— Mondovi — 
and dictated his own terms of peace to Sardinia. This 
inroad into Italy roused Austria to resist his conquests, 
and wrest, if possible, that goodly territory from French 
domination. But in this desperate game the accom- 



155 

plished Wurmser found more than his equal, and army 
after army were annihilated by the resisdess movements 
of the young general of the Republican army. The 
batdes of Lodi and Wagram were among the splendid 
achievements of Napoleon's military skill at this period. 
On his return to France he received every honor which 
national enthusiasm could ascribe to him. He was 
invested with the oversight of the immense preparations 
decreed for the invasion of England ; and while the eyes 
of the world were turned towards the English channel in 
expectation of this event, suddenly the French fleet is 
seen disembarking Napoleon and the army of Egypt on 
the banks of the Nile. The destruction of the French fleet 
by Nelson, and Bounaparte's flight from his army at a 
time when even his military skill was insufficient to gain 
ihem the mastery of Egypt, stamp this enterprise as an 
unfortunate one for the French arms, though splendid 
in its conception, and rich in scientific results. 

Alone, in a frail vessel, hunted by the war-ships of 
England, the future conqueror of the world coursed the 
waters of the Mediterranean. Protected only by that 
destination of Providence to which we alluded in the 
commencement of this article, he sets his foot in safely 
on the soil of beautiful France which showed her green 
fields and vine covered hills baptized in the bloody w^aters 
of faction and anarchy. 

The sun-burnt warrior of Egypt clears widi the bayonet 
the corrupted halls of revolutionary legislation ; he is 
elected chief Consul of the provisional consulate ; — next 
first Consul for life ; next, Emperor of France — King 



156 



of Italy. In each of these offices he was ahke the king, 
and gained nothing by his titles. We have reached a 
page in his life which we cannot read without sorrow — 
it is the divorce of Josephine. This act of selfish cruelty 
shows beyond redemption how power had frozen his 
heart to affection, and how ambition had reduced the 
stern arbiter of nations to the low standard of those legiti- 
mate kinglings whose birth only gives them claims to the 
sceptres which they propagate with their species. How 
much more noble if Napoleon had not servilely imhated 
the example of those miserable beings into whose sacred 
inclosure of rights divine he had broken like a destroying 
angel ! His marriage with the Archduchess Maria 
Louisa of Austria succeeded. Before this all had been 
like an ascension towards a peerless height — it was the 
summit. 

At this moment Russia alon'e of continental Europe 
presented a formidable barrier to Napoleon's project of 
universal domination and seemed to bound the horizon 
of his ambition within a compass too narrow for his 
haughty spirit. Every nerve and energy of France and 
her imperial chief were put to the task to humble Russia. 
The enterprize was one of gloomy magnificence- — a 
tornado of destruction — the accumulated force of pro- 
vinces and kingdoms thrown by the projectile momentum 
of military despotism upon the north of Europe to lay 
waste all that opposed or to roll back in ruin, if repelled, 
upon the fields where it was gathered up. Napoleon 
was one who hazarded his all on this single game. 
Winter with its savage bowlings — fire in its most terrible 



157 

exhibition on earth, and patriotism beyond the power of 
gold to tempt from duty, wrought deliverance for the 
czar and ruin to the invader. The retreat from Russia 
fills an awful page in history, compared with which the 
accounts of the most bloody battles are as idle romances. 
Weakened and rendered desperately powerless by this 
tremendous recoil of destruction upon the destroyer's 
head, nothing remained for Napoleon as the allied forces 
of three kingdoms were traversing France and investing 
Paris, but abdication and exile. With a demeanor 
which bespoke him unconquered by adversity, Napoleon 
departed to Elba, only to pause a moment preparatory 
to his last, his closing struggle. His departure from the 
island — his enthusiastic reception by the armies and 
people of France — the retreat of tlie Bourbons from a 
throne on which they had scarcely been seated — the 
Hundred Days of Napoleon's renovated power, — and 
his exertions to regain the balance of empire in the 
battle of Waterloo, pass before the mind with the rapidity 
of the closing scenes in the development of a thrilling 
tragedy. 

After his defeat at Waterloo, Napoleon made an unsuc- 
cessful appeal to the chambers assembled at Paris to put 
once more the strength of the nation in his hands that he 
might retrieve his fortunes. Lafayette was one of the 
committee who bore to this warrior monarch the refusal 
of the chambers, and the indications that France no 
longer acknowledged his authority. This intelligence was 
received without emotion. A throne gained or lost could 
not move the proud repose of a spirit like Napoleon's. 



158 

We pass rapidly over succeeding events, and visit the 
*• terror of world' on the lone rock at St. Helena. Here, 
he appears to have borne his reverse and downfall with 
a philosophy which did not fail4itm until sickness subdued 
his spirit. He received distinguished strangers who 
sometimes made the pilgrimage of the southern ocean to 
witness worldly grandeur in eclipse, wiih affability and 
ser ^nlty. Byron has thus sung his admiration of perhaps 
a soul kindred to his own, unbending under the wreck of 
every earthly hope : — 

Well thy soul iiaLli brooked the turning tide. 



With that untaught, innate philosophy, 
Which, be it wisdom, coldness, or deep pride, 
Is gall and wormwood to an enemy. 
Wiien the whole host of hatred stood hard by, 
To watch and mock thee shrinking, thou hast smiled 
With a sedate and all enduring eye; 
When fortune fled her spoiled and favorite child, 
He stood unbowed beneath the ills upon him piled. 

Captain Basil Hall, one of these visiters, describes 
Napoleon's appearance as noble and prepossessing in 
the extreme. This was the last year of his life and at a 
time when common report in Europe represented him 
as pining away in sickness. But as his end approached 
he felt and expressed that he was no longer the Napoleon 
of other years. His sister Pauline sent him a physician 
and two priests of the Roman church from Italy. He 
died on the 5th of May, 1821 — the day after a tremen- 
dous storm of rain and wind on the island which had not 
ceased at the moment when the conqueror of a world 
was engaged in his last delirious struggle with a mightier 
conqueror than himself. 



159 

GENKRAL RICHARD MONTGOMERY. 

The American revolution developed characters of 
such sterling merit that the grave and the forgetfulncss 
of death should not be permitted to conceal them from 
a posterity \>.iich have the most substantial reasons for 
remembering ancestral virtue with emotions of gratitude. 
The calm equanimity of peace would never have called 
into view the stern, yet magnanimous qualities ci the 
patriot soldier ; — war only, as horrible and dreadful as 
it is, has power to reveal the energy of the brave in full 
glory. The field, therefore, in every age when taken 
in the sacred cause of human right, and in the spirit of 
freedom, has been the pathway to an enviable distinc- 
tion — and many a warrior whose duty has led him to an 
untimely grave has gathered a fresher and more enduring 
garland of reputation than a long life of civic virtue and 
labor might have gained him. Yet, it cannot be denied 
that a fictitious and seductive splendor has been associated 
with deeds of chivalrous daring irrespective of the prin- 
ciples which may have prompted to action. 

But Richard Montgomery was a man whose whole 
soul was put into his action, after a full and warm-hearted 
persuasion that what he purposed was morally right — 
and, on the whole, conducive to the largest amount of 
beneficence. Happy for young America in her cloudy 
morning and in the fierce struggle for national existence 
that her cause presented so much of the aspect of suffering 
and oppressed innocence as to attract to her tearful 
standard a spirit so brave and generous as was Mont- 
gomery's ! 



160 

Born in Ireland, and blessed with the lofty and patriotic 
education of the most favored class, he entered the army 
at an early age and learned the art of war under the 
accomplished generals of those times. He was sent to 
America some years before the commencement of the 
revolution in the capacity of a captain of the British 
Grenadiers; but, in 1772, three years before the war, 
he quitted the service of his king, and became a beloved 
citizen of a nation that was then pluming its wings for an 
eagle flight. Shall it be said that love, the gentlest yet 
strongest of passions, rather than the impulses of repub- 
licanism, swayed him in this crisis of his life ? Be it so . 
it was an honor even to Montgomery to love the beautiful 
and sweetly accomplished being to whom he surrendered 
his noble heart and received one in return tenderly sensible 
to his manly graces and devoted to his welfare. He 
married the daughter of Judge Livingston of the state of 
New- York — and thus, as a member of one of our most 
respectable and patriotic families, he became a favorite 
son of America, too soon, alas, to write the certificate of 
his citizenship in his own blood ! 

The successful attempt of Colonels Arnold and Allen 
on the British post at Ticonderoga indicated the future 
plan of procedure in relation to the Canadas. It was 
determined to put down all English authority throughout 
the continent. The brave Montgomery and Schuyler 
were appointed to this service, and Colonel Waterbury's 
regiment of the Connecticut line and two regiments of 
New-York militia were reviewed in the city of New- York 
and destined for the northern campaign. One corps of 



161 

this small army was commanded by the late veteran Col. 
Marinus Willet. The entire force consisted of about 
three thousand men. 

On the arrival of the troops at Albany, the sole com- 
mand devolved on Montgomery, as Schuyler was detained 
in an important Indian negotiation. The army reached 
Ticonderoga August 21, 1775 — were overtaken by 
General Schuyler at the Isle La Motte, who assumed his 
allotted share in the command and made a successful 
landing at Isle aux Noix. From this post every onward 
step in their progress was doomed to be a contested one. 
St Johns, a fortified post in the British Canadas, was the 
first spot where Montgomery began to redeem his farewell 
pledge to his amiable and affectionate wife. The last 
words she heard him utter were — you shall never blush 
for your Montgomery. 

A column of one thousand men was detached in boats 
from the Isle aux Noix, and, landing opposite St. Johns, 
marched to storm the formidable redoubts. They were 
received with a destructive cannonade from the fort, and 
encountered a numerous body of Indians in ambush. 
Finding their enterprize nearly hopeles-, instead of 
attempting to storm the fortress they threw up a breast- 
work as if to commence a long drawn system of reduction, 
and immediately retreated to the Isle aux INoix. Such 
was the state of General Schuyler's heakh that he was 
compelled to leave the army, and once more the entire 
command of this important expedition reverted to Mont- 
gomery. On the 17th September the American force 
left the island and opened a battery against St. Johns — 
14 



162 

but, being nearly destitute of ammunition, there was little 
prospect of an effectual attack until Montgomery made 
a masterly movement of a part of his force upon forti 
Chambly, six miles distant from St. Johns, which henj 
captured and found six tons of powder among the spoilsi' 
of conquest. With this important acquisition he pressed, 
his advances upon St. Johns so successfully as to haveu 
effected its surrender on the 12th of November — by] 
which five hundred regular troops and one hundred( 
Canadians became prisoners of war, and thirty-ninec 
pieces of cannon, seven mortars, two howitzers, and( 
eight hundred small arms fell into the hands of thee 
intrepid captors. 

In a few days after this, Montgomery was the conn- 
queror of the city of Montreal, at which place he madee 
prisoners of General Prescott and about one or twoc 
hundred soldiers. Governor Carleton barely escapedt 
the fate of Prescott ; he was indeed for a few moments.; 
in the same house with a number of American soldiers- 
and escaped only by the air of unconcern and noncha- 
lance with which he walked out of the house attendedc 
by the housekeeper. He was conveyed down the St. 
Lawrence in a boat propelled with muffled oars as fan 
as the Three Rivers, from whence he hurried to Quebec 
and hastily put that important fortress, then the last hope 
of the British, into something like an attitude of defence. 
After taking possession of eleven vessels which were 
moored at the wharves and leaving a small garrison to 
keep possession of the city, Montgomery urged his way; 
down the river with the design of investing Quebec. 



163 

While these events had been transpu'ing, Washington, 
from his camp at Cambridge near Boston, detached Col. 
Arnold with eleven hundred men to penetrate the British 
territories in the vicinity of Quebec through the immense 
wilderness of what is now the State of Maine. Encoun- 
tering hunger, sickness, and extreme fatigue, this little 
army emerged from the howling wilderness eight hundred 
strong, and showed themselves to their astonished foes 
from Point Levi opposite Quebec. Such was the con- 
sternation excited by their sudden appearance that had 
they found immediate conveyance across the river, Que- 
bec must have fallen ; but the time necessarily spent in 
assembling canoes gave Carleton, who had just then 
escaped from the hands of Montgomery, time to arrange 
his defences and call in the aid of the neighboring Cana- 
dians. When Arnold crossed the St. Lawrence and 
formed in battle array upon the celebrated plains of 
Abraham, he found the enemy so well prepared for his 
ireception that an attack was deemed unwise ; he sent a 
.summons for the town to surrender and repeated it — but 
received no answer excepting the contemptuous one of 
firing upon his messenger. After displaying himself for 
a few days in this position he encamped at Point aux 
Trembles about twenty miles below Quebec to await the 
arrival of Montgomery. 

The junction of the two divisions took place on the 
first of December. Montgomery, with his native decision, 
immediately appeared before Quebec to earn the laurels 
or the grave which Wolfe had earned on that same rocky 
field. In a few days he opened a battery within seven 



164 

hundred yards of the citadel walls, but made no impres- 
sion on account of the lightness of his artillery ; yet the 
cannonade which he constantly kept up served to mask 
his real designs which were to attempt an escalade. On 
the night of December 3 1st, the last night of the year 
1775, Montgomery ordered Majors Brown and Living- 
ston to make each a feigned attack upon the upper town, 
while Arnold and himself made two real ones on the ; 
opposite sides of the lower town. Montgomery attacked 
on the side of the town washed by the St. Lawrence 
and Col. Arnold with about four hundred men on the ( 
side washed by the river St. Charles. Montgomery's 
column wound their way close under the dark rocks of) 
Cape Diamond, obstructed at every step by huge blocks 
of ice ; but at length having reached the palisades andi 
gateway of the fortification it was cut through and Mont-: 
gomery entered the enclosure of the guard or block-: 
house at the head of his division. The guard house had < 
been deserted by the soldiers on the first noise of thei 
assailants, but a straggler returning by chance took up a 
match and fired a piece of artillery loaded whh grape, 
which swept the gateway just as Montgomery entered. 
He and his aids were numbered with the dead. Through 
an unaccountable neglect of duty the surviving senior 
officer ordered a retreat. 

Arnold's troops on the other side of the town forced 
an entrance, took a battery, and the next morning with- 
stood the whole force of the British garrison for three 
hours before they surrendered themselves as prisoners 
of war. 



165 

The following particulars are detailed in an affidavit 
of Mr. James Thompson, an aged inhabitant of Quebec, 
made at the time the remains of General Montgomery 
were removed to New- York for reinterment, according 
to an act of Congress authorizing the erection of a monu- 
ment to his memory : — 

' I James Thompson, of the city of Quebec, do 
testify and declare, that I served in the capacity of an 
Assistant Engineer, during the seige of the city, by the 
American forces under the command of the late General 
Montgomery. In an attack made by the tioops under 
his immediate command, in the night of the 31st Decem- 
ber, 1775, on a Britsh post at the southermost extremity 
of the city, near Pres de Ville, the General received a 
mortal wound, and wnth him were killed his two Aides- 
de-Camp, McPherson and Cheeseman, who were found 
on the morning of the 1st January, 1776, almost covered 
over with snow. Mrs. Prentice, who kept a hotel at 
Quebec, and with whom General Montgomery had 
previously boarded, was brought to view the body after 
it was placed in the Guard Room, and which she recog- 
nized, by a particular mark which he had on the side of 
his head, to be the General's. The body was then 
conveyed to a house immediately opposite to the Presi- 
dent's residence, who provided a genteel coffin, which 
was lined inside with flannel, and outside of it with black 
cloth. In the night of the 4th January, it was conveyed 
by me from Gobert's house, and was interred six feet in 
front of the gate, within a wall that surrounded a powder 
magazine near the ramparts bounding on Louis Gate. 
14* 



166 

The funeral service was performed at the grave, by the 
Chaplain of the garrison. His two Aides-de-camp were 
buried in their clothes, without any coffins, and no person 
was buried within twenty-five yards of the General. 
The coffin of the late General Montgomery, taken up 
on the morning of the 16th of the present month of June, 
1818, is the identical coffin deposited by me on the day 
of his burial, and the present coffin contains the remains 
of the late General. Subsequent to the finding of Gene- 
ral Montgomery'^ body, I wore his sword, being lighter 
than ray own, and on going to the Seminary, where the 
American officers were lodged, they recognized the 
sword, which affected them so much that numbers of 
them wept, in consequence of which, I have never worn 
the sword since.' 

Thus passed from life the generous and lofty minded 
Richard Montgomery. His virtues were eulogized by 
some eloquent members of the English Parliament and 
drew forth an expression from the tyrannical prime 
minister, which breathes so much of the agony of malice, 
that no eulogium could be more eloquent in his praise — 
* curse on his virtues ; they have undone his country /' 

'Yes, yes, I go,' he whispered soft, 

'In fi'eedom's cause my sword to wield, 
Columbia's banner waves aloft 

And glory calls me to the field.' 
Then foremost on the foe he prest 

While war's rude tempest wildly roar'd 
Till gushing from the hero's breast, 

The purple tide in torrents poured. 



167 

He fell, and oh, what fancies stole 

Through memory's vista bright and warm, 
Till one loved image o'er his soul 

Came like an angel in the storm. 
But loudly swelled the bugle's blast, 

His hand instinctive grasped the steel ; 
Again it swelled — but all was past, 

The warrior's breast had ceased to feel. 



AURORA BOREALIS. 

Chill morning of the north ! how wildly premature 
The gorgeous flashings of thy beams 
Have stained with blood the pale colure, — 
Pouring through heaven volcanic streams, 

That whirl in eddying currents round the pole 

As fiery coursers circle round their goal. 

Roll up the steeps of night thy bannered sheets of red, 
With chariots kindhng as they run, 
And battle columns deep and dread — 
Tlien, southward, moving near the sun. 

With rocket flame and signal beating high, 

Charge up the zenith of the tropic sky. 

But when o'er Africa thy crimson eagles pause, 
Let volumed thunders sternly peal, 
Pleading humanity's sweet cause. 
Till nations all her wrongs shall feel j 

And let thy bloody signs in heaven remain 

Till Ethiopia walk the earth again. 

For God can hear her bitter wailing rise no more 
Burdening the ear of weeping heaven. 
And seas must wash her clotted shore 
Whence all her kingly sons were driven, 
To toil in chains till dying struggles paid 
The body's ransom where its dust was laid. 



168 

TliE ECLIPSE. 

Roll on, inconstant moon, while millions gaze ! 
Thine hour of potency and pride hath come, 
When thy pale orb, with shallow oceans hemmed, 
With puny mountains strown, throws basely back 
On the Fire Giant's flaming brow a frown 
Cold as the chill penumbra of the tomb. 

So the ungrateful heart forgets a friend, 
And turns its leaden, dull opaque to dim 
The smiles of goodness like the sunhght thrown 
But to wake vipers from their frosty bed— 
And, as a sun made brighter by eclipse, 
The face of friendship, beaming through the fogs 
"Which a vile traitor's breath has blown abroad, 
Shines godlike from the blue empyrean down 
Upon the clay where reptiles generate and rot. 
Fchrvciry 12, 1831. 



THE YEAR MDCCCXXX. 

Years pass — eternity remains unchanged — 
That clime where mortal eye hath never rangeci. 
Where spirit armies drawn from death's domains 
Look down in triumph on red battle plains: 
No more to change or dust they bow the knee. 
The high-born dwellers in eternity ! 
But earth rolls on through liquid seas of light. 
Still dark with crime, and still with virtue bright 
One day a king is on his crimson throne — 
The next he wanders in disguise alone : 
One day a good man mourns with want bestt — 
The next he wears a starry coronet. 



169 

A fearful year Iiath pastM 
A trumpet voice hath blown, 

With wirldwind breath, a blast 
That shakes each despot throne ; 

And traitor kings now bend the knee 

Before the chiefs of liberty. 



Oh, wilder yet may blow that trumpet tone, 

And louder yet may bleeding victimsgroan — 

For kings will grasp their crumbUng thrones in death, 

And yield their rights divine with parting breath ; 

Red o'er the Rhine the star of war may rise 

And shed its baleful light on Europe's skies j 

The Cossack on his hungry war horse turns 

His fierce, broad eye, where thirst for conquest burns. 

And bids his stormy drum for battle roll 

To nerve for deeds of death his iron soul ; 

And France, great France ! hath crushed her lilies down 

And planted spear heads round the people's throne — 

She bids her eagles scour the frontier clouds , 

Where haste lier youthful chivalry in crowds, 

And once again may glorious Lafayette 

Tread battle fields with life's red current wet. 



Away from war and hate. 
With olive branches crown'd. 

At plenty's door we wait. 
And strew our garlands round. 



Long may our country underneath the tree 
That l)ears the guardian flag of liberty, 
Be earth's asylum where distress shall find, 
A generous nation to misfortune kind. 



170 

ADDRESS. 

Delivered April 30, 1828, at the Laying of the Corner Stone of M. E, 
Church, in J^orth Bennet-street, Boston. 

The corner stone of our holy religion is Jesus Christ. 
All spiritual temples that rise to the glory of God, stand 
on this foundation. — For other foundation can no man 
lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Yet how 
sweetly did the circumstances of the dear Redeemer's 
death prefigure the laying of the corner stones of the 
earthly temples ! Weary, bleeding and faint, the Lamb 
of God toiled up the steeps of Calvary. The earth was 
broken as we now have broken this earth, and the cross, 
a corner stone, was planted, that all succeeding temples 
might recognise this foundation, and glory in their origin. 

It is a solemn transaction to lay the corner stone of a 
religious edifice — solemn, because celestial eyes are 
turned downwards during the solemnities — because He, 
who seeth from the beginning to the end, is noting every 
circumstance, and quite as dear to the bosom of Almighty 
Love, is the humble, feeble commencement, as the proud, 
triumphant conclusion. Yes, dear friends to the cause 
of Christ, in this labor of love — this offering of gratitude? 
you have the consolation to reflect that your Heavenly 
Father has already marked the outline of your rising 
temple — that he has already seen the top-stone laid with 
joy — that he knoweth the ' sum of good to man,' which 
shall accrue from this enterprise, arid how the joys of 
heaven shall be increased by the everlasting consequences 
that are to flow from the erection of this temple. 

As we lay this stone, there is no need that we ttll the 



171 

world what are the peculiar and distinguishing doctrines 
of the Methodist Episcopal Church. They have lon."^ 
been before the world — they have overcome the hosts 
of critical and theological opposition — they have com- 
mended themselves to the consciences of men, because 
the great founder of Methodism, laid down as one of his 
fundamental principles, what indeed should be engraven 
on every Methodist heart to the latest period of time, — 
that he cordially gave his fellowship to all that was good 
in every denomination of christians, departing only from 
their errors. And it is given us after the lapse of half a 
century, to contemplate the moral grandeur of Wesley's 
life and precepts. To reform the reformation after it 
had grown cold, after its living principles had become 
entombed in the ashes of a wordly establishment, was 
Wesley's high, apostolic purpose. How he succeeded, 
let the voices of three hundred thousand members of 
the English Wesleyan Church and the four hundred 
thousand of America answer. Yea, let the brightening 
prospects of the church generally — hi the voice of a 
thousand revivals— let the mighty rushing sound of the 
Holy Spirit answer. 

While we proclaim no creed ; let us with holy grati- 
tude thank God, our Father, for the previous volume of 
his holy word, which we receive without disputation, 
taking God our Father at his word, which we intcipret 
from the common received version, according to the 
obvious meaning of the language. Let us thank God 
that this most precious word contains sincere promises 



172 

of free pardon to all mankind who shall come on the 
simple terms of faith in Christ and repentance for sin — 
that this pardon, and the blessed assurance of it, are not 
long delayed from the penitent, sorrowing spirit, which 
is broken for sin. Let us thank God, our Father, that 
the prophecies of his most holy word, that they may be 
accomplished, demand the revivals of the present age, and 
even a far more abundant outpouring of the Holy Spirit — 
an effusion before which all that has passed shall be as 
drops before a sweeping shower. Let us thank God 
our Father in heaven that the example of sudden con- 
versions and extensive revivals of religion, recorded in 
the most holy volume of inspiration, fully warrant the 
genuineness and establish the validity of the present 
awakenings that prevail in such a glorious manner in 
our communion. I 

And now while our eyes shall rest on these material 
walls as they rise in proportion and beauty — while we 
gaze upon that which the tooth of time shall gnaw away, 
and the envious winds and storms shall strew on the 
earth from whence it was taken, — God sees the spiritual 
building which shall be the peculiar glory of this second 
temple. This corner stone, which we this day place in 
its bed, where it shall rest for ages, is but a type of thai 
precious ' head of the corner,' which is found in the 
spiritual edifice. How firm and how eternal is the 
glorious ' house not made with hands' which the eye of 
faith contemplates, as intimately connected with these 
walls that have begun to rear themselves around us ! 



173 

It Is indeed located on earth ; but the edifice rises above 
the cloud}' atmosphere of time and catches the sunshine 
of immortality, close under the arch of the empyrean, 
where the last vapors of the universe redden with the 
blushings of an Eden morning. On its broad walls, 
higher up than the mountains of earth, and above the 
stormy regions of the clouds, is inscribed in glorious 
letters — Salvation ; the gates are praise, and angel 
cohorts float on snow white chariots round its light 
encircled battlements. 

But on this undertaking — on the erection of these 
material walls, we implore the benediction of heaven. 
To Him in whose name we set up our Ebenezer, we 
commit the undertaking and the precious lives of our 
brethren and fellow citizens engaged in these labors for 
Christ. 

To this temple, we, our children and our children's 
children shall come on the days of Sabbath gladness. 
Souls here shall be born for glory. Here too shall we 
come in our days of sorrow, when to the earth we 
commit our babes, our wives, our parents, our dearly 
beloved friends ; and in our sighing and sorrowing, we 
shall drink of the consolations which shall ever flow 
around this holy place. 

In the name of the Father and the Son and of the 
Holy Ghost, we lay this corner stone, and commit to 
Israel's God the keeping of our souls, of the inscription 
which we here deposit, and of the high destinies of our 
beloved Church and country. 
15 



174 

SPRING. 

The season of ethereal mildness — when the wide, 
deep heavens purify themselves and shake out the 
contractions and wrinkles of winter ! It has come to 
us as in times past, unchanged ! God has not forgotten 
to be gracious and faithful. And the earth, obedient to 
the heavenly signs above, arrays her late cold bosom with 
green— and has placed that green only as a dark back- 
ground to her more beauteous embroidery of flowers 
which ere long shall intermingle with and surmount the 
parent tint ; and white and red and orange and green 
and violet shall be found in the fragrant coverings of the 
meadows and the hills. The birds know the season 
of love and of song. They are out in the earliest blush 
of the morning. Their songs now sound with, and 
shape, all nature's melody to an anthem of harmony, 
varied and measured with more than mortal skill. It is 
the many-tongued song of creation which I hear rising 
up to the great Creator. Receive this bursting volume 
of praise, oh thou magnificent Creator and Preserver, 
from the green earth thou hast borne safely through 
the tossing winter clouds, like a strong ship brought from 
the stormy cape into the spicy Indian ocean! 

Man, whose capacious heart and searching intellect 
can take in and comprehend this universal song of rejoic- 
ino", should not be a frozen statue amidst the adoring 
works of God. Let every heart be warm and overflow- 
ing with praise. — For no living creature in the air, in 
the fields, in the forest or the floods, has half the cause 
of thanksgiving that human beings have. All nature 



175 

seems to smile for man, and pours out into his hand the 
fullness of her vernal offerings. The fields are green 
and lovely to his eye—the grass blooms afresh over the 
graves of his ancestors — the summer harvests, the fruits 
of autumn are before him — the blessings of friendship 
are around him — and still, after this earthly scene hath 
shifted, another scene incomparably more grand and 
beautiful spreads out and stretches interminably before 
him. It is the Spring of a blessed immortality. 

The time hastens when religion shall fill the earth with 
a heavenly influence more bland and balmy than that 
of Spring. War, like the storms of winter, shall be no 
more. The tales of hoary wrong and error shall be 
rehearsed at the fireside as things that have been — not 
as those then in existence. Death shall come calmly 
then, and have no sting. The sweet earth shall then 
invite Jesus to his second coming—and the Savior shall 
hear the voice. 



LONELINESS. 
' I bebeld, and lo, there was no man, and all the birds of the heavens were fled.' 

A SENTENCE like the above, found in the writings of 
a pagan poet, would have raised its author to the pinnacle 
of fame. The prophet had contemplated the great 
wickedness of God's ancient people under a weight 
of mercy and blessings ; he had viewed it in every atti- 



176 

tude ; the awful turpitude of these untold transgressions 
unfolded more and more ; a voice of affliction from Dan 
burdened the winds, and another great cry went up 
from Mount Ephraim. The prophet was pained at 
his heart ; the clangor of a trumpet rang through his 
soul ; the alarm of iron war fastened upon his senses J 
the mountain weight of a nation's sin settled down upon 
the care-worn seer. In a moment the scenery of vision 
changes, and inspiration draws a picture of desolation 
which mocks the eagle efforts of genius. 

No man can read the four short vei-ses that describe 
this desolation without feeling a chilly horror creeping 
over him, as if light and life and being were going out 
with the last rays of the departing sun. The prophet 
says : — * I beheld the earth, and lo, it was without form 
and void ; and the heavens, and they had no light. — I 
beheld the mountains, and lo, they trembled, and all the 
hills moved lightly. I beheld, and lo there was no man 
and all the birds of heaven were fled. I beheld, and 
the fruitful place was a wilderness, and all the cities 
thereof were broken down at the presence of the Lord, 
and by his fierce anger.' 

This cannot be said to be a beautiful passage ; for 
its awful import destroys the light of beauty. It cannot 
be said to be sublime ; for the emotions awakejied by 
the sublime are pleasurable after the first intensi^of 
their excitement has passed by. Read this passaged 
thousand times and the bleak image of desolation will 
rise cheerlessly to the mind each time. What are we 
to think of such passages that cast such enduring frowns 



on sin from age to age — in language too that awakens 
feelings not to be classed with ordinary sensations ? Is 
not sin branded with eternal infamy by inspiration 1 

Let those, who consider individual or national sins as 
small matters, pause over this passage, bringing clearly 
before the mind's eye each image of desolation — then 
let them ask, what hath put out the fires of heaven — 
what hath quenched the stars — what hath removed the 
mountains — what hath erased vitality from the voiceless 
earth — what hath rolled the wilderness again over the 
place of cities and the fruitful vales 1 Sin — sin — would 
be the melancholy response to break the unearthly 
silence. 



AFRICAN MISSION. 

Part of 071 address delivered before the Young Men^s Missionary Society in 
John street Church, on the evening of April 22, 1831 . 

i RISE with the most heartfelt concurrence in your 
noble design of sending a missionary to the colony of 
Liberia on the coast of Africa. Through this propi- 
tious opening you will reach the heart of that benighted 
continent. Your object is clothed with the magnificence 
of benevolence, and accords with the promise of God 
to Ethiopia in the latter days. The descendant of Africa 

not an anonymous being — the child of accident. We 
15* 



178 

see him laboring in the scorched fields of the slave holder, 
the inheritor of a labor that profiteth him nothing — and 
this lean inheritance of misery is, he well knows, all the 
earthly good that hard-hearted task masters design for 
him and his children. We see his face darker than the 
pale demon of avarice by whom, at the whip's end, he 
is driven to his ceaseless, profitless toil : — but no one 
marks this man of grief as one on whom the sun has 
looked in his wrath and scorched him into an abject 
inferiority to human kind. Rather, when we see him? 
we think of a far-off land — a vast continent which hangs 
in the opposite balance to our own stupendous America, 

We feel, when we see the slave in free America^ 
as if we beheld a branch of ancient empire torn from 
its parent stock withering under another sky. 

Oh, how I tremble for America, when I think of the 
sin of slavery, piled mountain high against her in the 
chancery of heaven ! Fearfully anticipating and yet 
deprecating the judgments which so terrible a national sin 
calls down upon the fairest portion of earth, I cannot 
but feel a thrill of horror as I repeat the eloquent lan- 
guage of one who alluded to the punishment of a certain 
nation for the less cruel and inconsistent sin of Infidelity. 
Says he, * the tale made every ear, which heard it, tingle, 
and every heart chill with horror. It was in the language 
of Ossian, the song of death. It was like the reign of 
the plague in a populous city. Knell tolled upon knell ; 
hearse followed hearse ; and coffin rumbled after coffin, 
without a mourner to shed a tear upon the corpse or a 
solitary attendant to mark the place of the grave. 



179 

So terrible and thus fertile are national punishments. 
They come like the great thunder blasts, with roar and 
flame and sudden power. We deserve them. Should 
heaven this evening require the wasted generations of 
Africa at our hands, what should we answer. Spare, 
Lord, and make not our boasted liberties like the early 
dew ; mete not to us with the measure we have given 
and are giving to others. 

But, yet, heaven be praised ! there are some streak - 
ings of light amid this blackness. It may be that repent- 
ance may be granted to America, and liberty and 
religion be granted to Africa. It may be the plan of 
that wonder-working Providence, ever able, out of evil 
to educe good, to make humble, repentant America 
carry back the men and the women and the babes she 
has stolen, and with them send back immortality and the 
mountain nymph of freedom. 

But, oh my brethren and friends, will it not be a scene 
of unparalleled sublimity when one vast continent heaves 
in its unutterable emotions of benevolence and pour its 
full bosom of love upon a heretofore blasted coast ! The 
sight is like creation — it is making a continent anew, 
and building up amidst the ruins of centuries a fourth 
part of the round earth. It is godlike to create — to 
make fertility breathe over the waste — to make the dull 
organs of death distend with the breath of rosy health. 
It is godlike to wipe away the tears of suffering — to pour 
oil and wine into the furrows made by the cruel vt^hips. 
How grand then will be the prospects when great 
America shall disenthral a sister continent — and pay up, 



I 



J 80 

in the sight of God and man, a debt of untold suffering 
and blood ! 

Friends of man ! the work is begun — and the heavens, 
where the mighty storms, the price of Africa's ruin, 
sleep, brighten a little as if the thunder-bolts of wrath 
would be laid aside and never be permitted to do the 
cruel work of destiny. The work is begun — not like 
planting a battery on our sea beat shore, and throwing 
now and then a rocket across the Atlantic to illuminate 
dark Africa — but the battery is built on African soil, 
and, already, the beacon light of salvation flashes up her 
river of golden sands, and reflects from her mountains of 
emerald. A pattern of our American republic has been 
planted on the continent of Africa — and along with it 
the glorious institutions of our ever-blessed religion. 

I have not time, nor is there need, to go into the full 
details of colonization facts and history. Monrovia now 
lifts up its spires to catch the early sunbeams, and on 
them lingers the parting light when the chariot of day 
has rolled on to the land of happy Amei'ica. The mode 
of Liberian government — the relation of the colony to 
this country — have aflbrded themes of proud exultation 
to our patriot statesmen. 

In this colony so signally favored of God and now ex- 
erting so propitious an influence over the destinies 
humanity in two continents you have purposed, young 
gentlemen of the Missionary Society, to station your 
missionary. Moved by the Holy Spirit and an unquench- 
able zeal for Africa you send your messenger out under 
the shadow of the banner of your country and give him 



181 

the broad commission to live and die for Africa, He 
goes, — and finds hundreds of hearts like his own engaged 
in the same ennobling cause — and he has power to 
point the inquiring natives not only to the Savior of 
sinners, but to the churches and a rising republic, where 
liberty dwells, and the soul of man expands to the 
growth of immortality. The colony will be a shelter to 
him and to as- many as the Lord shall give him in a 
strange land. 

There are most affecting views connected with this 
noble design of yours, young gentlemen. It would 
almost break the heart to contemplate them. 

What think you will be the joy of a slave family who 
long have toiled on a soil rendered doubly barren by the 
curse which ever attends slavery — what will be their joy 
when they hear a voice sweet as angel-lyres and strong 
as the deep roar of mountain vdnds speaking to them 
from Africa, saying, return home, ye eociled, but now re- 
deemed of the Lord ? What think you will be the joy of 
America and the shout of heaven, when the last surly 
slave-owner shall smile like a human being upon his fel- 
low clay, and shall say to them over whose bodies he 
had fastened chains that death alone might break — say to 
them, go to your own land in peace, and take this, the 
hire of your sad labors here, with you ? What a plea- 
sure would it be thus to lose a million and a half of our 
numerical population ! Hasten the time, oh thou God 
of mercy. 

Another view I will take from the mountain of faith. 
One hundred years hence what a scene will the two 
sister continents present ! Slave holder and slave there 



182 

will be none. All gone to their last reckoning or free. 
One standing then on the highest American summit 
might cry — we are free ; praise the Lord ! Africa, with 
the shout of millions from her thousand hills, would say. 
Amen — and then ' Ethiopia would stretch out her hands 
to God.' 

Another view, young gentlemen, is this : Heaven, the 
world of spirits, is startlingly near to us. Thin is the veil 
which separates us from the dead. Bright spirits, long 
since departed, may be in the midst of this audience. It 
may be that here stands the immortal part of Samuel 
J. Mills, the illustrious pioneer of African colonization, 
it may be, young gentlemen, that here stands the spotless 
and beloved Summerfield — your first president. Your 
great and noble design this night will add even to his 
heavenly joys. You committed him to the dust ; you 
builded his monument ; you cherish his memory in your 
hearts ; but only by devising and executing great things 
do you emulate his glorious example. Is he here, the 
sainted one, to glow with your fervors to-night and 
rejoiccfover your good devised ] The souls of unnum- 
bered millions who now rest in glory, could their voices 
be heard in these low vales of time, would give a shout 
of acclamation like the seven-voiced thunders of the 
Apocalypse. Great deeds — actions of high emprise — 
the lofty designs of humanity — the drying of sorrow's 
tear — the rending of the dungeon fetters of the soul,—' 
are all known and are illustrious in heaven. There 
stands high up the sacred court the record of your deed 
this evening — and there too may our unworthy names 
be written. 



183 
WELLINGTON. 

Arthur Wellington was descended from the Wellesley 
family in Ireland. The ancient family name was Colley 
or Cowley. Arthur was born at Dargan near Dublin, 
May 1, 1769. After a liberal education at Eton, he went 
to Algiers in France, and obtained his military education 
under the auspices of the celebrated Pignerol. While 
at the military academy he received an ensign's commission 
and went into the service of his country in December 
1687. At the age of twenty -three he was a captain in 
the 18th regiment of Light Dragoons, and in the year 
1793 was made a major of the 33d regiment. He was 
promoted to the office of lieutenant colonel during the 
same year. His first service was under his illustrious 
countryman, the earl of Moira, in the invasion of Holland. 
He next departed for India with his brother the earl of 
Mornington who had received the appointment of 
Governor-General of the British Oriental Empire, and 
arrived at the mouth of the Ganges, May 17, 1798. Tn 
the tremendous conflict with Tippoo Sultaun, Colonel 
Wellesley sustained an arduous and conspicuous station 
in which he made full proof of undaunted courage and 
military skill. He was at the seige, the storming, and the 
surrender of Seringapatam. 

Immediately after this event he was appointed Major 
General and had the sole command of the army in the 
long drawn contest with the numerous, confederated 
Rajahs, whom he at length humbled and bound by treaties 
of submission and amity. He was elected Knight of the 
order of Bath and returned to England in 1805. 



184 

He was returned to Parliament and took his seat as a 
member, and in 1806 married the Hon. Miss Elizabeth 
Pakenham, daughter of the late Lord Longford. He 
accompanied Lord Cathcart in the Danish expedition and 
was at the head of a division at the storming of Copen- 
hagen. He returned and was in his place in the house 
of Commons in February 1808. 

General Sir Arthur Wellesley now entered upon a 
battle field worthy of his consummate abilities — he was 
destined against the victorious French legions on the 
plains of Portugal and Spain. Articles of an unpropitious 
convention suspended the hostilities which had raged for 
a time with various successes, and General jWellesley, on 
his arrival in England, passed the ordeal of a Court of 
Inquiry ; but the articles of the convention being rejected 
by the king, Wellesley went to his legislative duties in 
Parliament and the peninsular war was prosecuted under 
other auspices. At length, after the death of several 
distinguished commanders, Sir Arthur superseded Sir 
John Craddock and entered again upon that splendid 
arena of battle which has given him the well earned title 
of the greatest captain of the age. After a series of 
successes at the passage of the Douro, at the recapture 
of Oporto and the battle of Talavero, he was elevated to 
the peerage as Viscount Wellington in the year 1809. 
In 1810 he was still opposed to the French on Spanish 
soil, and his arduous services ended with the invasion of 
France, the capture of Bordeaux, and the occupation of 
Paris by the allied sovereigns. 

After Napoleon's return from Elba, Lord Wellington 
met him and finished his days of empire on Waterloo. 



185 

THE CHRISTIAN'S ENCOURAGEMENTS. 

BeholJ, I s( nd an angi'l btfare thee, to keep ihee in the way, and to bring the e 
into the place which I have prepared.— £.Todus xxiii. 20. 

No Christian can expect to reach heaven without op- 
position and difficulty. 'In the world ye shall have 
tribulation,' is the prophetic warning Jesus gave his 
disciples on the eve of their separation. It was neces- 
sary to prepare their minds for the great tribulations they 
were called to endure. In the primitive ages of the 
Christian church, the sufferings of God's people were 
frequent and unparalleled. Although the hand of per- 
secution has long since been paralyzed, and the followers 
of Christ are not called to suffer the spoiling of their goods, 
or the burning of their bodies, the divine decree, that 
all who live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution, 
is not repealed. For notwithstanding the fair face the 
world shows towards Christianity, and the many good 
and wholesome laws that rear up a wall of brass around 
it, the heart of man is unchanged, and his carnal dispo- 
sition is the same as it was in the hottest times, when per- 
secution raged, and the tribulations of the righteous were 
neither few nor small. This world is a wilderness still, 
and to the Christian who has escaped from the city of 
destruction, and turned his face Zionward, it is truly for- 
midable. He hears the frantic ravings of the coming 
storm on the outspread wings of the tempest. He sees 
the bleak mountains throwing their giant shadows athwart 
the path he must tread— the interminable sands, stretch- 
ing away, and lost in the distance, dim his weary eve— 
16 ^ " 



186 

while hordes of implacable enemies harass and wound 
him, as he presses onward towards the Jordan of deliver- 
ance and hope. He is, therefore, fearfully apprehensivey 
that he will one day make shipwreck of faith, and prove 
a recreant from the grace of Christ. But when he be- 
comes acquainted with the supports and consolations of 
the gospel, and finds that God is not unmindful of his 
people, and has always opened a door for their relief — 
that the way to heaven, though difficult and dangerous, 
is rendered easy, and even pleasant, by the kindness of 
our Heavenly Father, his mind is relieved, and a sweet 
peace takes possession of his soul. The Christian thus 
supported and enlightened by the Spirit of God, is 
calm amidst the storm. In the midst of strife, and 
when the battling elements rage around him, and threaten 
destruction to his hopes, he hears the voice of his de- 
liverer above the storm, saying unto him, ' Go forward — 
fear not, for I am with thee ; be not dismayed, for I am 
thy God. 1 will strengthen thee , yea, I will help thee 5 
yea, I will uphold thee by the right hand of my right- 



• When dai'kness intercepts the skies, J 

And sorrow's waves around me roll, 
And high the storms of trouble rise. 

And half o'erwhelm my sinking soul ; 
My soul a sudden calm shall feel, 
And hear a whispei-, *' Peace, be still !" ' 

The Christian has a faithful guide. — The children of 
Israel were not left to tread the mazes of the wilderness 
alone, and without a guide. God not only raised up 



i 



187 

Moses and Aaron to go before them, and to encourage 
them in the devious paths through which they were 
called to pass, but he also provided a cohmin of smoke 
by day and a pillar of fire by night, to conduct them in 
safety in their hazardous journey to the promised Canaan. 
Nor is he less solicitous to provide for the Christian's 
journey to the heavenly Canaan. The blessed Jesus 
has undertaken to guide the poor pilgrim through the 
valley of miseries ; and for that purpose, he has already 
travelled the road, and made himself acquainted with all 
its difficulties, and windings, its sorrows and tribulations, 
that he may be the better able to minister to the neces- 
sities of his suffering people, and conduct them in safety 
to the port of endless bliss. The Holy Spirit's influence j 
the light of the sacred word, and the presence of the 
angel of the covenant, conspire to render the Christian's 
path plain, to secure his feet from stumbling, and to keep 
his face turned towards Mount Zion, the city of the 
iiving God. Thus guided, he marches foi-ward without 
fear, knowing tliat all his ways are ordered for the best — 
believing in hope against hope, and resolved, through 
difficulty and danger, darkness, bereavement, and death, 
to persevere to the end ; knowing that those only who en- 
dure to the end, shall be saved. 

He has a strong guard. — In a dangerous road, a 
guide is necessary ; but is not always sufficient. But 
the Christian has both a guide and a protector. 'The 
Lord God,' says the Psalmist, * is a sun and shield.' 
* He is both a guard and a light. The Lord fought all 
Israel's battles. The Lord is a man of war : The Lord 



188 

is his name. Pharaoh's chariots and his host hath he 
cast into the sea. Thy right hand, oh Lord, is become 
glorious in power : Thy right hand, oh Lord, hath dashed 
in pieces the enemy ! Thou, in thy mercy, hast led forth 
the people which thou hast redeemed : Thou hast guided 
them in thy strength to thy holy habitation. He was 
their Captain — and vain is the arm of might, the councils 
of the wise, or the rush of armed legions, without his 
assistance and support. The race is not to the swift, nor 
the battle to the strong. It is the Lord who giveth the 
victory. He alone can subdue our foes, and overcome 
the obstacles in the Christian's course. When he with- 
holds his aid, and leaves us to ourselves, the feeblest 
worm is capable of destroying us, the most insignificant 
circumstance may work our ruin. But they who put 
their trust in the Lord, shall never be confounded. They 
shall be like Mount Zion, that cannot be moved. When 
the king of Assyria encompassed the Lord's prophet in 
Dathan, with horses and chariots, and a great host, his 
servant said unto him, Alas, my master ! how shall we 
do? And he answered, fear nothing; for they that be 
with us, are more than they that be with them. And 
Elisha prayed, and said, Lord, I pray thee open his eyes, 
that he may see. And the Lord opened the eyes of the 
young man : and he saw, and behold the mountain was 
full of horses and chariots of fire, round about Elisha. 
The Christian's guard are numerous and mighty. They 
encamp around the faithful like a wall of fire. The forms 
of the heavenly ones, unseen indeed by mortal eyes, 
crowd the region of atmosphere where we dwell. Their 



189 

presence is a safe protection from dangers seen and un- 
seen. They watcli their charge continually, and never 
slumber nor sleep. No change of circumstances, poverty, 
or pain, weal, or wo, makes any change in their regards, 
nor lessens the deep interest and anxious solicitude they 
always manifest for the heirs of glory, in screening them 
from harm, covering their heads in every severe conflict 
with their spiritual foes, and preserving them alive when 
death and hell stalk abroad, trampling upon the haughty 
ones of the earth. The chivahy of heaven is the Chris- 
tian's guard ! He is supported by the arm of Jehovah. 
Though all the powers of darkness should be leagued 
against him, he need fear no ill — for greater is he that is 
for us, than all that is against us. * What enemy can 
compete with the Almighty ? or measure strength with 
the arm that supports a universe of worlds? What re- 
sistless tide, but he can, in a moment, roll back ! What 
mountain billows, but he can stay ! Can he not hush 
the wild uproar of contending elements, smooth the 
ruffled brow of the blackening heavens ; arrest the forked 
lightnings in their destructive course, and change blus- 
tering winds into Zephyrs, soft as the balmy airs of 
Eden ! — All things are subservient to his will, and minis- 
ter to his pleasure. And can he not engage them all in 
the Christian's service, to ensure his happiness and safety, 
and to conduce to his present and everlasting good ! 

' What though a thousand hosts engage, 
A thousand worlds my soul to shake, 
I have a shield, shall quell their rage, 
And drive the alien armies back.' 

16* 



190 

He has rich and abundant supplies. — Israel had nigh 
fainted in the wilderness for lack of bread ; his soul was 
thirsty; but he cried unto the Lord iu his trouble, and 
he delivered him out of his distresses, and he heard his 
voice. Sweet water streamed from the smitten rock, 
and manna dropped down fresh from the propitious skies. 
That rock prefigured Christ. His body was stricken, 
his bosom cleft, and from thence flowed the living waters 
that make glad the city of our God. His body is bread 
indeed, and his blood is drink indeed. The Lord has 
provided a rich and generous feast for his children. The 
table is large, and extends all over the earth. There is 
no spot on the footstool, it matters not how barren, or 
dreary, rocky, or uncultivated, but what is visited by the 
rich dews of heavenly grace, or from whose soil, does 
not spring up celestial fruit, pleasant to the taste, and 
refreshing to the soul. For the Christian's accommoda- 
tion, the Lord has opened up springs in the desert, and 
crowned the unfruitful places of the earth with the flowers 
of paradise, and sweetened the very air we breath with 
the spicy gales of Calvary. All along the King's high- 
way, cast up for the ransomed of the Lord, are the 
arbors and shady and beautiful groves, his hands have 
planted and adorned, to comfort and refresh the weary 
pilgrim in his toilsome journey to the desired haven. 
He is constantly supplied with every thing necessary 
and useful to satisfy his wants. Shining ones attend his 
footsteps — extensive prospects, ever-varying, reaching 
far up above the realm of clouds, glowing with the 
touches of a divine pencil — ravishing sounds of melody 



191 

and song, with liopes immortal, tiiat know no bound — 
and the recompense of reward, that no eye hath seen, 
nor ear hath heard, and which hath not entered into the 
heart of man to conceive, — all these, v.'ith more than 
tongue can utter, or language describe, are intended for 
his benefit and use, to animate, encourage, and strengthen 
him, till he hears the trumpet of victory, exchanges the 
mortal coil for the wardrobe of the skies, and mingles 
with the church triumphant on the banks of deliverance. 
He is not travelling an unknown road. — When the 
Israelites fled from the face of Pharaoh and his armed 
host, they were treading an unknown path. No monu- 
ments arose to their view — no voices came upon the 
winds to tell them that others had trodden the same way 
encountered the same difficuhies, triumphed over similar 
obstacles, and that they might push on without falter- 
ing, having the noblest examples to stimulate them to 
deeds of glory and suffering. No encouragements like 
these, were adduced to sustain the minds of the 
affrighted multitude, who stood trembling between the 
sea of difficulty and the pursuing army. But the Chris- 
tian sets his foot upon the proud wave, feeling assured 
that myriads have passed over in safety. He enter? the 
wilderness unmoved ; confident, that he who conducted 
all that had gone before, securely and triumphantly, un- 
maimed and untouched to the purchased possession, is 
able to save to the uttermost all them who humbly rely 
upon his promises, and commit their souls to his faithful 
keeping. Thanks be to God ! the Christian is not like 
one who beats the air. He is not trying an experiment. 



1 



192 

He has the glorious example of the bravest and the best 
to encourage him — kings and princes, warriors and 
statesmen, philosophers and poets, who have entered the 
same course, tracked the same rough and thorny paths, 
have been willing to submit themselves to the same 
guide, borne patiendy the same reproaches, endured the 
same tribulations, and experienced the same joys, con- 
solations and supports, and are now quietly reposing 
under the shadow of the Almighty's throne. 

'They all are robed in spotless white, 
And conquering palms they bear.' — 

When the Christian beholds these clouds of wit- 
nesses — when he hears the dying testimony of these illus- 
trious persons — and reads engraven on their histories, 
and the monuments of their valor and faithfulness, the 
great fights they endured, the deep waters through 
which they passed, the bitter cups they were forced to 
drain, and the cruel mockings and scourgings to which 
they submitted with patient resignation and holy joy ; 
manifesting their integrity, unsubdued, and without wa- 
vering, even in the hottest fires and in the dreadful 
hour of martyrdom, clapping their scourged and bloody 
hands with shouts of holy triumph^- — his very soul within 
him burns and pants to emulate the integrity, the 
patience and Christian fortitude, for which these heroic 
spirits were so nobly distinguished. 

He is not a solitary traveller. — He is accompanied 
by multitudes from almost every country under heaven. 
They have neither decreased in dignity, nor in number. 



193 

Their achievnients, it is true, do not seem to make so 
much noise in the world, as did those of the fathers in 
the days of the church's purity and glory. But they are 
still conquerors through Him who hath loved us, and are 
nobly contending for the faith once dehvered to the 
sain's, with the w^orld, the flesh, and the devil. The 
enemies of Christianity do not now assume so formidable 
an array as they did in the days of the apostles and 
their immediate successors, when the iron hand of the 
law, and the united suffrages of a great people, were its 
sworn foes ; but they are equally formidable in another 
point of.light, and more insidious and wily, and require, 
perhaps, more skill and judgment to encounter them with 
any hopes of success. When the faggots are heaped, 
the fires burning, and men's lives are in danger ; extra- 
ordinary gifts, deep religious feeling, with brave contempt 
of death are elicited, not often seen when the church is 
permitted to worship without fear, under her own vine 
and fig-tree. There are, however, instances of piety, 
zeal, and self-devotion to the cause of the Redeemer, 
among Christians at the present time, in fine keeping 
with the giants of Trajan's and Julian's days. These 
are the companions of the Christian, whose sentiments 
are elevated and whose conversation is in heaven. They 
are not of this world ; for they desire a better country, 
that is, a heavenly : wherefore God is not ashamed to be 
called their God ; for he hath prepared for them a city, 
a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. 
They are bending their steps to the country for which 
he is bound, are partakers of the same like precious 



194 

faith, and contend manfully with him in the ranks of the 
redeemed army, for the glorious reward of which he 
hopes to be a partaker on the morning of the resurrec- 
tion. What splendid motives to induce the Christian to 
be faithful unto death ! He is one of that great, united, 
and universal host, which is going forward to certain 
victory, achieving deeds of high renown, planting their 
footsteps above the stars, and writing their names, in 
characters of living light, over the gates of the celestial 
city. 

This subject, thus presented, suggests many encourag- 
ing reflections. The serious-minded, who are yet num- 
bered among the unregenerate, often are depressed and 
kept mourning in their desolate and barren state of mind 
by not applying to themselves the rich and varied en- 
couragements which naturally and graciously flow from 
the blessed system of our holy religion. This class, and 
it is composed of vast numbers, fear that, after having 
commenced the gospel race, they shall fail by the way. 
They are faithless in respect to divine aid. They see 
much around them of a discouraging nature ; see many 
reputed Christians whose glimmering lights scarcely 
scatter the thick darkness of the wilderness; and hear 
many a doleful song from that country which should, and 
most certainly would be, to the living, spiritual Christian, 
'■ the land of Beulah.' the very suburbs of heaven. So 
in former times, the Israelites were discouraged by the 
difficulties of the wilderness way that spread out before 
them ; they murmured for the flesh-pots of Egypt, 
although at the immense price of national bondage, rather 



195 

than follow that glorious pillar of fire and cloud, which 
was leading them with a sure and steady progress to the 
lovely valleys of Canaan. The serious mind should ever 
remember that God is not afar off. He hideth not him- 
self in darkness. Creation is even now full of the sym- 
bols of his presence, as palpable and as strongly indicated 
to the man of faith, as the pillar that stretcheth itself 
from earth to the skies, alternately in the van and the 
rear of the chosen tribes. Would not thousands, who 
now linger behind, while the church is marching onward, 
arise at once, if they could only have the assurance that 
their steps should not faulter in the heavenly pathway ? 
Will it encourage this class to tell them that a humble 
yet determined resolution to serve the God of Jacob 
through weakness and in strength, will be answered by a 
blessing from Jehovah ? Will it animate one of these 
desponding minds to learn that so far as we trust or rely 
upon God, just so far additional resolution, comfort, light, 
encouragement, and a good assurance is bountifully be- 
stowed, through Jesus Christ, by the same beneficent 
hand that pours out the light of day upon all lands, and 
sprinkles the reviving dews, and opens the treasures of 
the clouds upon the parched plains — that same Almighty 
One, who is perpetually giving, without measure and 
without price, even to the ungrateful and the unthankful ? 
All this — yea, more, may be told to this class of heshat- 
ing mourners on the unerring authority of the King of 
kings and Lord of lords. It is precious to the downcast 
soul to learn that the promises of peace and mercy may 
be applied to its own case — its own particular wants. 



196 

Christians may reap a new and ever increasing harvest 
of blessed assurance from the word and the mighty 
spirit of the text. Yes, Christian, thine every step is 
ever attended by an angel — the angel of the covenant — 
unseen he may be to the natural eye — but he certainly 
is near thee, if thou standest on holy ground. His 
love passeth the friendship of earth. His steps are with 
thine when thou passeth through the chilling waters of 
the sea of death. Why, oh Christian, dost thou not put 
on an unfailing courage, and shout with a song of triumph 
as loud as the thunder of the great deep, when it cries 
to heaven from its lowest caverns. Strong is thy defence ! 
Thine attendant is one whose eye is dreadful to thine 
enemies ; but full, overflowing with tender compassions 
for thee ! 

The wide spread ^Sacramental host of the church 

gathers all its confidence and its full assurance of victory 

from this unsealed and unfathomable fountain of endless 

consolation. Let us for one brief moment look at the 

attitude of the church. Now, perhaps, in tears, in dust, 

trodden down by the oppressor and stained with her own 

blood ; to-morrow, she shines like some glorious one, and 

the kings of the earth tremble before the holy splendors 

of her countenance. To-day, following with mournful 

step a brother in Jesus to the lonely tomb ; to-morrow, 

with a loud song proclaiming that all is well with him 

v^^ho is in the dust ; all is well this side of death, and all 

is triumphant beyond ! To-day, a seemingly feeble band, 

against which, proud words of scorn are levelled ; to- 



197 

morrow, a host with banners streaming under the whole 
heaven, with more than mortal music burdening every 
breeze — with crowns and plumes, and the intense gleams 
of immortal panoply, kindling on every cloud, and illu- 
minating every mountain and valley. Well might the 
seer, who, for gold, sought out a curse for Jacob, say : 
How goodly are thy tents, oh Jacob, and thy tabernacles, 
oh Israel ! . 

This was a prospective view — only lifting up a little 
the curtain which hung over the future prospects of the 
church. The same thought is amplified, if not adorned, 
by Pollock, the pious poet, who sung his soul to sleep 
with such strains as these : — 

•How fair the daughter of Jerusalem, then ! 
How gloriously from Zion's hill she looked ! 
Cloth'd with the sun ; and in her train the moon ; 
And on her head a coronet of stars ; 
And girding round her waist, with heavenly grace, 
The bow of mercy bright ; and in her hand 
Immanuel's cross — her sceptre and her hope.' 

But these views, rich as they are with unspeakable 
blessings, are taken from the earth. The church now 
is seen going farther on to the very place which God 
has prepared for her. Change and vicissitude and death 
invaded the territories of Jacob below ; but he has a 
place now prepared for him ; a kingdom not to be mea- 
sured by human meters, not invaded by earthly woes, or 
battle, or change. Countless angels are throwing open 
the gates to this region, as immeasurably wide as it is 

beautiful, beyond the power of language to paint ; and 
17 



IDS 

trumpets and harps pouring forth the volumes of song 
such as earth never heard, summon the redeemed to their 
last, joyful resting place. 

Death is now no more. Sin is shut out forever. Hea- 
ven burns with its accumulated bliss. It has now reaped 
the great harvest of the earth. It now, to its other 
songs, hath added the greater one of redeeming love. 
And now beyond this point, it is not permitted to pene- 
trate farther. Here this blessed interdiction begins — 
eye hath not seen — ear hath not heard — heart hath not 
conceived. All beyond is glory unsufferably bright. 



BIBLICAL SUBLIMITY. 

It is now a sort of standing acknowledgment in the 
mouths of thoughtless thousands that the sacred writings 
abound with sentences of matchless sublimity. But ask 
these amateurs of the sublime, in what passages they find 
the thrilling emotion which takes hold of the heart and 
binds the frame in subdued wonder, they only repeat 
what the rhetoricians have carved out for them ; they 
say — ' God came from Teman and the Holy One from 
Mount Paran !' But however sublime may be these 
often quoted texts, there are yet deeper fountains of 
emotion, bottomless as the ocean of wisdom, which first 
gave birth to passion, and then rolled up the element on 
which it may feed for ever. 



199 

It is not our design to analyze the emotion of sublimity ; 
ihe philosophers and rhetoricians have done this long 
centuries since. Neither shall we draw our vision of 
sublimity from the stupendous drama of the apocalypse, 
in which heaven, earth, with its far off ages, and hell with 
its unfathomed horrors, appear and are withdrawn like 
the shifting scenes of a mysterious but terribly graphic 
development alike important to men, demons, and 
heavenly ones. Neither shall we travel over the field 
so fully and faithfully explored by Lowth, by Michaelis 
and other critics on Hebrew poetry. It has been remarked 
by a philologist that the Hebrew language above all others 
is well adapted to express energetic action. It has been 
called an abyss of verbs and verbal derivatives. Strong 
and discriminating and powerful, the Hebrew phrase 
never slumbers over the idea it would express. It bor- 
rows its illustrations from nature, and therefore the 
biblical stud ent must study nature to know what inspira- 
tion means. It flashes its undimmed blaze upon a 
subject before hidden or dark or complicated, and does 
more in a word than philosophy could have done forages. 

Without reference then to criticism or philosophical 
inquiry, we will indulge ourselves over a few passages 
of inspiration as th^ pervading spirit of the * book of 
books' would teach us. 

There was a time when the Lord God had not caused 
it to rain upon the earth. The clouds had never gathered 
upon the mountain brow ; never had the solemn thunder 
called out from cloud to cloud the growling summons of 
sJie storm ; never had the red hghtning fringed the bo- 



200 

som of the black tempest with rapid and hissing furnace 
fires, untamed and, savage and unsparing, the very bolts 
of vengeance launched red hot upon the watery atmos- 
phere with the lion growl of power. — What was the 
action of the Almighty mind in this season of drought 
when there was not a man to till the ground ? Simply 
and subhmely this :— There went up a mist from the earth, 
and watered the whole face of the ground. The first 
white vapor that ever exhaled from shore and fountain 
and flood was seen creeping along the serpentine brooks, 
gathering density and shape in its progress, disclosing its 
heaviest columns where Pison and Gihon and Hiddekel 
and Euphrates rolled their waters to far separated 
regions. This mist hung like a bridal curtain awhile 
over the earth, then went up and was dissolved in show- 
ers, and Eden bloomed afresh beneath the first tears of 
the affectionate heavens. 

Man had perished on account of infidelity and crime 
beneath a deluge of waters. The whole race with the 
exception of a single family was extinct. This family 
was afloat with the frail planks of gopher-wood between 
them and the hungry waves, which entombed humanity 
and the rich memorials of ancient art and grandeur. One 
hundred and fifty days had this melancholy remnant of 
mankind heard the pattering of tremendous rains and 
the beating of such surges as never might have raved 
except on a shoreless ocean. Hope was dying within 
them. What now was the action of the Eternal mind ? 
And God remembered JVoah * -^ ■'^ * and God made a 
wind to pass over the earth and the waters assuaged. 



201 

Not a single swelling epithet is here used or needed* 
Memory is described as the act of the infinite God — and 
then at his command the wind begins to roar through the 
confused mass of clouds and waves. Vapor and gloom 
no longer rule the atmosphere. The broken up deep 
sinks down beneath the breath of heaven, and at last 
hides its awful billows in the lowest caverns of the earth. 
Then to hush the fears of the terrified beings who had 
survived the death of a world, with what a sublimity of 
beauty, did God upon the first dark cloud that rolled 
over the summit of Arrarat plant his many-colored rain- 
bow? / do set my how in the cloud, and it shall he for 
a token. 

A death bed was spread in Egypt and a venerable 
man laid him down to die ; It was Jacob. He called to 
his sons, and said, Gather yourselves together that I may 
tell you what shall hefall you in the last days. One by 
one the fathers of the tribes advanced and heard the 
oracular words that destined them and theirs throughout 
futurity. Joseph approaches. His blessing is a sentence 
that casts eveiy heathen oracle into midnight shadows. 
A fruitful hough hy a well, whose hranches run over the 
wall * * shot at hy the archers * * a garland of blessings 
coming down from heaven above, coming up from the 
deep which lieth under, twined with love and fruitfulness' 
and reaching unto the utmost hound of the everlasting 
hills, on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the 
head of him that was separate from his hrethren. 

The Red Sea was running on in a sort of mournful 

cadence, dirge-like and echoing and wasteful. It swept 
17* 



202 

over a burled king and the chivalry of an empire. But 
on its farthest shore there was joy. A song of redemp- 
tion was raised by Moses and the warrior thousands of 
Israel. The first loud stanzas rolled like thunder, or the 
sound of many waters, I will sing unto the Lord, for he 
hath triumphed gloriously : the horse and his rider hath 
he thrown into the sea. Then every image of sublimity 
and wonder was gathered up from the face of the sea — 
from the blast of the strong winds — from the ocean frozen 
into a wall of defence, then melted into a torrent of de- 
struction — from the terror of the event on the dukes of 
Edom and the inhabitants of Palestine. The song of 
a nation dies away like a solemn echo upon the shore. — 
But hark ! the silver sound of timbrels strikes the ear, 
and a thousand daughters of Israel dance with graceful 
gestures on the sand, while with one sweet gush of har- 
mony the response to the loud song of the warrior host 
rings along the ranks of loveliness — And Miram answer- 
ed them, sing ye to the Lord, for he hath triumphed glo- 
riously ; the horse and the rider hath he thrown into the 
sea. 

Sinai was there — a terrible mountain on which Jeho- 
vah stood. Before its awful pyramid of flame and cloud 
stood the chosen tribes, brought thither, by God himself, 
borne as on eaglets wings. On the third day a thick 
cloud, like an impenetrable crown of darkness, capped 
the mountain ; the thunder shook the rocks, and the light- 
nings blazed fearfully around ; the sound of an unearthly 
trumpet swelled louder and louder, until heart and flesh and 
the inmost soul of man trembled under the strange and 



1 



203 

searching roar. One man alone whose lofty forehead 
reflected back tlie quenchless flames ascends the moun- 
tain. The arms of the everlasting blackness inclose him 
round. The law was given. The mountain still was 
dreadful ; the glory on its summit was like devouring 
fire. Here is a sublimity which earth cannot imitate — 
monarchy cannot ape- — nor the time defying colors of 
genius and poetry paint. It is worthy of God. 

Moses, the man of God, and the leader of Israel 
through forty years of sojourn in the shadow of a wilder- 
ness, came to the age of one hundred and twenty years 
with unwasted strength of body and undimmed lustre or 
eye. His last song is like that of a bird of Paradise, o 
a heavenly swan, whose dying strains breathe the soul 
of melody into the dutl organs of death. He closes his 
song by a blessing upon each of the tribes — and the 
reader is surprised at the similarity of Joseph^s blessing 
to that uttered by Jacob four hundred years before. To 
him, through Ephraim and Mannasseh, are again as- 
signed the precious things of the heavens — the dew, and 
the deep, couching beneath — the sunny fruits, and the 
precious things lighted by the moon — the chief things of 
the ancient mountains, the precious things of the lasting 
hills. An untold glory still circles the head of him who 
was separated from his brethren. Horns of power are 
bequeathed him with which he is strangely to push the 
nations even to the world's end. Moses went to his God 
from Nebo — but never shall the grandeur of his charac- 
ter or of his poetry fade from the memory of man while 
time lasts or eternity treasures up the records of virtue. 



204 

1 
What misty form comes up from the frosty bed of 
death, roused up in a monarch's evil day by a voice 
more potent than the incantations of witchcraft ? It is 
Samuel. Pale and stiffened, v^^ith the drapery of the 
grave around him, his rayless eyes are fastened on a 
crown devoted to ruin. The tongue that ever uttered 
the truth in life speaks it solemnly in death. Why hast 
thou disquieted me to bring me up from the grave's re- 
pose ? ^ * * tomorrow shalt thou and thy sons be with 
me ! Where ? Saul, thy kingly form must trail the dust, 
and thy proud head lie low on Gilboa's mountain, when 
another sun shall look out again upon Palestine ; and a 
better than thou shall pensively sing — how are the mighty 
fallen ! 

The long, dreamless sleep of" the grave is grandly 
pictured by Job — or rather penciled with a sublimity of 
comparison which dries up the waters of the sea, and 
then points away to the departing heavens as the period 
of this dreary slumber — the end- of death's dominion 
over humanity. As the waters fail from the sea, and 
the flood decayeth and drieth up ; so man lieth down 
and resteth not : till the heavens be no more they shall 
not awake, nor be raised out of their sleep. 

In what composition of human authorship can there be 
found numbers as sweetly flowing or images as purely 
pastoral as those of David's : — 

The Lord is my Shepherd, 

I sfiall not want. 

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures : 

He leadeth me beside the still waters. 



But the task we have imposed upon ourselves of se- 
lecting specimens of biblical sublimity is a boundless one. 
The heart of the reader must gather, from the same 
sources whence we have drawn the few examples we 
have recorded, the full and inexhaustible materials for 
an emotion which shall expand its powers forever, and 
make it capacious of happiness. The book of Isaiah is 
an epic poem of unparalleled beauty, strength, and sub- 
limity. If inspiration furnishes its awful subjects and 
lends the sound of its everlasting thunders, and the black- 
ness of its eternal storms, genius furnishes the electric 
flash and illuminates the demonstrations of Omnipotent 
power ; genius chastens the imagination that is glowing 
under the excitement of prophecy, and seeks the wide 
world over, and travels amidst the morning stars to find 
every image of natuial grandeur with which to clothe the 
words and express the doings of God. 



STONY POINT 



The scenery of the Hudson river bears nature's grand- 
est imprint. The hand that framed an universe of worlds 
has thrown together along the banks of this noble stream 
a wild assemblage of rocks and mountains. The Palis- 
ades, as thev are called, commence on the western side 



206 

of the Hudson, just above the Weehawk or Weehawken, 
and extend about twelve miles up the river. They are 
bold, abrupt demonstrations of omnipotence, moulded by 
Him whose power is not bounded by time or circum- 
stance. The cannon of a thousand armies might roar 
out their ineffectual vengeance against this natural battery, 
which frowns over the broad bright stream at an eleva- 
tion of from sixty to one hundred and fifty feet, and the 
parapet would laugh in scorn at the power of battle. 

After the Palisades terminate, a country of hills and 
vales succeeds; the former rounded up like loaves of 
sugar, and the latter indented like dimples on the cheek 
of beauty. Occasionally, however, nature has projected 
into the stream one of her bold fronts — a miniature for- 
mation of those ' hills of fear' which cast their sombre 
shadows across the pass of the highlands. One of these 
projections is Stony Point. It stands out in bold relief 
from the rural scenery just below, and challenges the 
attention of the passenger who has been relieved from the 
sublimity of the basal'ic rocks of Palisades only to pre- 
pare him for a wilder development of nature's cran- 
iology. But the impressions which crowd into the 
spectator's mind in this region are not all derived from 
river, mountain, or valley, — tradition and history lend a 
melancholy glory to this revolutionary ground. On the 
right or eastern bank stretches away the celebrated * neu- 
tral ground' throughout the entire extent of Westchester 
county, where regulars, cow-boys, Virginia horse, and 
continentals, whigs and tories, appeared and disappeared 



207 



like the actors of a wild and bloody tragedy. On the 
left, Stony Point is allied to associations of military 
achievments and unfLiding'renovvn— while faither up, the 
memory of Arnold's treason, Andre's capture and un- 
timely although merited fate twines around the memorable 
rocks of West Point. 

Stony Point is about forty miles abov^ New- York, and 
ten or fourteen below West Point. It is a rounded, 
gravelly hill, of small extent, jutting into the stream, and 
connected with the main land by a low morass which is 
partially overflowed with the tide waters. It was fortified 
in the revolutionary war, and occupied by a small force, 
might have been considered as a remote outpost to the 
strong fortress of West Point. It was captured by the 
British in the year 1779, and strongly repaired and 
garrisoned by more than six hundred soldiers commanded 
by the brave Lieut. Col. Johnson. 

A few days before the sixteenth of July, in the same 
year, a tall, commanding personage, mounted on a strong 
charger, was seen on the eminences above Stony Point. 
He had a glass in his hand, and appeared to study the 
character of the defences with an intensity of interest. 
Johnson, who was returning the gaze of the horseman 
with his spy-glass, turned to one of his staff and remarked 
that the apparition on the hill portended no good. Ru- 
mors were afloat in the entrenchments that the same 
tall figure had been seen across the river on the highest 
opposite eminence the day before, like a horseman 
painted against the sky. A cow-boy said that this figure 



was the apparition of Washington, and that it never was 
seen excepting just before a battle or a thunder storm. 
But while these idle rumors floated around the atmos- 
phere of the camp, the real Washington, from observa- 
tions made with his own eyes, was concerting a soldier-like 
plan for its surprise. 

On the night of the sixteenth of July, by the twinkling 
light of the stars that broke over and through the clouds, 
two columns of soldiers might have been seen under the 
brow of the eminence in the rear of the fort. They were 
stem men — the silent, thoughtful men of New-England. 
The eagle-eyed Wayne was at their head, and his heart 
was like that of the lion. The regiments of Febiger and 
Meigs, with the youthful Major Hull's detachment formed 
the right column ; Buder's regiment, with two companies 
under Major Murphey, formed the left. The van of the 
right was formed of one hundred and fifty volunteers at 
whose head stood the brave Fluery ; one hundred volun- 
teers under Stewart composed the van on the left. And 
still further advanced, the noblest post of all, stood two 
' forlorn hopes' of twenty men each — one commanded 
by Lieut. Gibbins and the other by Lieut. Knox. Wayne 
stepped from man to man through the van-guards — saw 
them take their flints from their pieces and fix the death- 
bayonet. At twenty minutes past eleven, the two columns 
moved to the bloody work before them, one going to the 
left and the other to the right to make their attack on 
opposite sides. 

The inhabitants on the eastern side of the river first 



209 

heard a sharp crashing as the forlorn hope on either side 
broke in the double row of abattis ; the muskets of the 
sentinels flashed suddenly amidst the darkness, and in a 
moment the fortress vomited out flame and thunder as if 
a volcano had been ignited, and was tossing its lava up- 
wards. The cry of battle not to be mistaken, shrill, wild 
and fearful, broke upon the dull ear of night. But all 
was in vain for the fortress. Under the showers of grape, 
and full in the red eye of battle, the two gloomy, still, un- 
wavering columns moved on, and the two vanguards met 
in the centre of the works. The British made an instant 
surrender to avoid the extermination which awaited the 
deploy of the columns upon the intrenchments. Sixty 
three British soldiers lay dead at their guns ; five hun- 
dred and forty-three were made prisoners, and the spoils 
were two standards, two flags, fifteen pieces of ordnance, 
and other materials of war. Of the sons of New England, 
ninety-eight were killed or wounded. Of Lieut. Gibbin's 
forlorn hope, seventeen were no more. Of Lieut. Knox'rf 
about the same number were slain. 

These spots, where the life-blood of the free has been 
poured out hke w^ater, and where the traces of the revo- 
lutionary ditch and mound still remain, are altars sacred 
to the high recollections of freedom. Green be the turf 
over these departed patriots. The bold bluff of Stony 
Point is classic ground. Hither in future time shall the 
poet and the sentimentalist come to pay their tribute of 
affection and honor where 



' our fatherss knelt 

In prayer and battle for a world.' 

18 



210 
THE FAITHFUL SAYING- 

Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.— 1 Tim. i, 15. 



I 



Christ Jesus came into the world. — From that hour, 
when the promise of a Savior broke the fearful gloom 
that had spread its dark curtains over paradise, down to 
the auspicious moment when celestial choirs poured upon 
the ears of wondering shepherds the new and ravishing 
song of deliverance and peace, the world had been gra- 
dually preparing for his appearance. The children of 
men, those more especially to whom appertained the 
covenant and promise, were taught to expect some great 
personage, clothed with divine authority and unlimited 
power. At length, in the fulness of time, after a variety 
of strange phenomena, operating alike on the heathen 
and Jewish world, presenting signal omens, portentous 
and overwhelming, the star of the promised Prince ush- 
ered in his glorious reign, and Christ was worshipped by 
the Eastern magi, while yet an infant, under the signifi- 
cant tide of King of the Jews. The coming of the 
Messiah had been described by saint and seer, patriarch 
and king, with the pomp of oratory, and the eloquence 
of song. The circumstance and stateliness of kingly 
dominion and magnificent display, portrayed in the Jewish 
writings, tended to give importance and grandeur to his 
expected appearance and reign. But notwithstanding 
the picture was highly colored, the outline vast and im- 
posing, it was^not to be understood literally. The glory 
and the beauty, the magnitude and the display, were to 
be spiritually discerned ; and therefore, none but spiritual 



211 

minds could comprehend the connexion between the low- 
liness of the Redeemer's person and appearance, and the 
lofty annunciations of the prophet's harp. The Jews were 
wholly absorbed in the letter, and they were thus unpre- 
pared or unwilling to pierce the veil of flesh, and poverty 
of circumstance, which flung a cloud over the ascending 
Sun. The prophet sang in vain, ' Rejoice greatly, 
oh daughter of Zion ! shout, oh daughter of Jerusalem ; 
behold, thy King cometh unto thee !' The Jews believed 
the record, but they rejoiced not in the coming of Christ. 
The daughters of Jerusalem shouted not at the birth of 
their King. But though they gave no welcome to their 
long expected one, dazzling squadrons from the high em- 
pyrean, were not unmindful of the great event. If man 
sang no glad song, tuned no golden lyre, multitudes of 
the heavenly host hymned his praise, and celebrated his 
birth in lofty strains of angelic music. 

'In heaven, the rapturous song began. 

And sweet, seraphic fire 
Through all the shining regions ran, 

And strung, and tuned the lyre.' * 

And though no light flashed from the earth, ' to bid the 
brightest and best of the morning' welcome to our sin- 
stained soil, a new and brilliant star glittered in the 
dome of heaven, the precursor of his glorious reign. 

He was the brightness of his Father's glory, and the 
express image of his person ; yet, Hear, oh heaven ! and 
be astonished, oh earth !' he became man ! He was in 
the form of God, and counted it not robbery to be equal 



212 

with God ; yet, he descended from his royal throne, 
clothed himself with the dust of his footstool, and became 
bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh ! In the ignoble 
garb of a servant of servants, he entered the sinful and 
troubled abodes of mortality, to be our partner in suffer- 
ing and sorrow, that he might be deeply imbued with 
the finest sensitive feelings of poor human nature. 

* Touch'd with a sympathy within, 

He knows our feeble frame ; 
He knows what sore temptations mean, 

For he hath felt the same.' 

He came to his own, and his own received him not. 
He was despised and rejected by the very beings, for 
whose salvation and happiness he had left the glory he 
had with the Father before the world was, and from 
whom he had a right to expect the most profound rever- 
ence, and demonstrations of the highest joy. No sooner 
was it noised abroad that the Christ was born in Beth- 
lehem, according to the prophets, than Herod was 
troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. Abase and bloody 
order was issued by the pusillanimous monarch, who felt 
conscious of the insecurity of his throne, and trembled, 
lest the new born Prince was destined to wrench the 
sceptre from his impious grasp. Nor did their ma- 
licious and blood-thirsty designs against his person, his 
character, and ministry, abate, till the insulting, barba- 
rous, and tragic scenes of the garden, the judgment hall, 
the pillar, and the cross, consummated their diabolical 
purposes. 



213 

Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. — 
Man is guilty, weighed down under the curse of a law 
he has wilfully and wickedly broken. Having thus 
ruined himself, he is unable to meet the perfect obedi- 
ence required by the divine statute, and has thus sunk 
into deep and irremediable condemnation, exposed to 
wrath and punish nient, without any dawning of hope, 
or any intercessions of mercy. In this sense, men are 
sinners — all men. There is no exception ; for in Adam 
all die. All have sinned and come short of the glory of 
God. The whole world lieth in wickedness. There is 
none that doeth righteousness, no, not one. 

Man is unholy. Unholiness is guilt. The unholy and 
sinful dispositions of the human heart, are exhibited in 
the pages of man's history, with more or less enormity ; 
but they have invariably the same crimson type from 
Adam down to the present hour. This truth is established 
in every stage of his brief existence, in every country, 
and through all orders and grades of society. The whole 
family of man, being thus tainted with this great moral 
pollution, are thus separated from all friendly intercourse 
or communion with the pure Being against whom they 
have rebelled ,and whose government and laws they have 
slighted and trampled under foot. This separation from 
God deepens the pit into which tliey are plunged, ren- 
dering their case hopeless in this life, exposing them to 
the thunderbolts of the next, and to the eternal horrors 
of a terrible and irrevocable perdition. 

* How sad our state by nature is ! 
Our sin how deep its stains!' 
18* 



214 

To save man from his sins and to shield him from the 
impending ruin that thundered on his path, the Lord 
Jesus came into the world. ' He shall save his people 
from their sins,' is the signification of his name. His 
own words confirm this truth, ' the Son of man is come 
to seek and to save that which is lost.' 'I am not come 
to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.' This 
benevolent and godlike purpose engaged his attention 
during the whole course of his ministry and life, nor did 
his sufferings, or the cruellies he endured, even in their 
extreme and bitterest agonies, absorb this great leading 
feature of his character. 

The manner in which he accomplished this great de- 
sign, and prepared the way for the sinner's recovery, 
salvation, and happiness, is in perfect accordance with 
the claims of justice and the criminality of the offender. 
Man is guilty before God, condemned, and awaiting the 
sentence of death, unable to yield a perfect obedience to 
the divine precept ; without hope, having no plen, and 
totally ruined and undone. In this trying juncture, 
Christ offers himself as his substitute, places himself at 
the bar of justice, receives the blow intended for the 
criminal, obeys the law in all its minutliK and extent, 
satisfying its most rigorous demands, and making it pos- 
sible for the guilty and condemned wretch to be released 
from the bondage of sin, restored to the Divine favor and 
image; at the same time, guarding every infringement 
upon the justice of the lawgiver, so that God can now be 
just, and the justifier of all them who sincerely repent 
and unfeignedly believe in his Son Jesus Christ, the 



215 

slain Lamb, who is the propitiation for our sins, and not 
ours only, but for the sins of the whole world. There is 
no remission of sins without the shedding of blood. 

* To man, the bleeding cross has promised all : 
The bleeding cross has swora eternal grace,' 

See the consummation of the promise given to Adam 
in the hour of his depression, and in the night of his guilt, 
in the sufferings and death of Jesus ! Behold the foot 
of the promised seed bruising the head of the great ser- 
pent, and from the bloody brow of Calvary triumphing 
over principalities and powers, and making a show of 
them openly, strewing their honors in the dust, and 
withering the strength of the mighty and the renowned ! 
Behold the Son of the eternal God, clothed in the robes 
of his priesthood, dyed with the blood of the grape, alone 
and single-handed, treading the wine press of the wrath 
of God ! See him coming out of Bozrah, travelling in 
the greatness of his strength, crushing down the walls of 
our prison house, entering the lists with all our enemies, 
disarming death of its terrors, the grave of its boasted 
triumphs, bursting the barriers of the tomb, and binding:, 
with the golden chain of his atonement, earth to heaven, 
man to God ; lifting the everlasting gates, and pointing 
far, far away, up into the highest heavens, to the man- 
sions of everlasting blessedness and peace, prepared for 
the faithful from the foundation of the world. 

Who is the King of glory, who ? 

The Lord that all our foes o'ercame, 
The world, and sin, and hell o'erthrew; 

And Jesus is the conqueror's name. 



216 

The terms of salvation, are few and simple, and ac 
cord well with the plan of redemption and the character 
of the atonement made by Jesus Christ. Repentance 
towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, are the 
conditions prescribed in the gospel. Our repentance 
should be deep, sincere, and lasting; our faith of the 
operation of the Spirit, for faith is the gift of God. It 
should be fixed singly on God, through Jesus Christ, the 
great Mediator between God and man, without any re- 
liance upon ourselves, or our own righteousness ; for by 
the deeds of the law no man can be justified in the sight 
of God. He must therefore turn away from Sinai, and 
from self, from every part of heaven, from all hope and 
every plea, but, God be merciful to me a sinner. 

' None but Jesus 
Can do helpless sinners good !' 

Come to God, pleading the merits of a Savior — 

' Five bleeding wounds he bears, 

Received on Calvary ; 
They pour effectual prayers, 

They strongly speak for me. 
Forgive him, oh, forgive, they cry, 
Nor let that ransom'd sinner die !' 

And mark the success of the appeal — 

' The Father hears him pray. 

His dear anointed One ; 
He cannot turn away 

The presence of his Son ; 
His spirit answers to the blood, 
And tells me I am born of God. 



21*7 

The salvation alluded to is not circumscribed in its 
operations. It does not merely imply the entire acquittal 
of the condemned sinner. It changes as well as justifies; 
working a moral reformation in the dispositions of the 
heart, in the conversation, and the life. It is a salvation 
from all sin, from the least and last remains of the carnal 
nature. The Bible teaches this encouraging doctrine, 
using the language of authority, and plainly saying, that 
without holiness of heart, we shall never see God. The 
man who believes with a heart unto righteousness, to him 
is the reward, not of debt, and this reward is the indwell- 
ing Spirit witnessing with his, not only that he is born 
again, but that he is also sanctified, set apart for God's 
use, to be a vessel of honor in the spiritual church of 
the Lord ; the very thoughts of his heart being cleansed 
by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, so that he now 
perfectly loves God, and worthily magnifies his holy 
name. Are we justified ? Can we set to our seal, that 
God for Christ's sake has pardoned our sins? If we 
can rejoice in the divine favor, and know in whom we 
have believed, let us go forward, bearing precious seed, 
full of faith in the promises, and relying implicitly on the 
assurance of God's word, and we shall feel a spiritual 
enlargement of soul. We shall be saved with an entire 
salvation from all sin, and rejoice with joy unspeakable 
and full of glory. The designs of Christ's coming into 
the world will be answered in all their evangelical bear- 
ings. We shall no longer go mourning all our days, 
limiting the Almighty by our lack of faith, want of de- 
cision of character, and sinful backwardness. All the 



218 

Christian graces shall distinguish our onward course, 
irradiating our onward path, and giving out a beautiful 
epitome of true religion, in the conformity of our lives 
to the precepts of the gospel. 

We may go farther onward and still find, as we pro- 
gress, that immortal blessings spring up in consequence of 
Christ's coming, beyond the precincts of time. Christ 
came in to our world, that we might go into a better 
world. Christians have no expectation of reaping all 
the benefits of Christ's coming, in this world; here they 
expect to taste of his salvation ; in heaven it will be all 
their food. Here they expect, indeed, to love much, 
as much has been forgiven them — here they expect to 
pray much, as they have many wants — here they expect 
to praise much, as they have eternal cause for songs and 
thanksgiving — here they expect to be perfect, as their 
Father in heaven is perfect; and here, beneath nature's 
sun, they do expect the sun of heavenly joy will grow 
broader and more brilliant, as the sands of their earthly 
hours decline, until its rounded and palpable disk shall 
seem to absorb every other prospect ; but in heaven they 
expect not only an immeasurable flood of glory — they 
expect also, ever expanding capacities of mind, soul and 
spirit, to take in and enjoy this augmenting tide of holy 
delight. 

In conclusion, we pause a moment over the magnitude 
of the event, described in the words of the text, — Christ 
came into the world. The advent must ever rank high- 
er in the gradations of earthly occurrences than any 
other. As the closing of the Jewish dispensation and 



219 

ihe opening of the Christian era, it hears an imposing 
attitude ; as the accomplishment of promises which had 
cheered the inhabitants of the earlier world — as a most 
magnificent display of heavenly mercy and condescen- 
sion ; as a death blow to the otherwise unbroken tyranny 
of sin and destruction ; as the last sure refuge of huma- 
nity, under its load of woes and sufferings, and as fur- 
nishing the only ark of salvation that shall be able to 
bear up against the earth's second deluge, — that of fire, 
— the advent has an importance which calls for admira- 
tion, and demands the loudest songs of adoring angels 
and redeemed men. Christ came into the world, and 
every ancient type and shadow submerged in the full 
tide of glory that rolled before him at his coming. Christ 
came into the world, and, for the first and only time, the 
far wandering music of the sweet heavens struck on 
mortal ears. Christ came into the world, and the star 
of his empire arose in lovely radience over Bethlehem. 
He came and the demons of despair, with clenched 
hands, and blood-shot eyes, spread out their dragon 
wings, to return to their native hell. He came, and the 
realms of darkness were involved in heavier clouds, and 
gave out more terrific groans, as the last hopes of the 
thunder-blasted monarch below were quenched forever 
in the streams that flowed down the rocky steeps of Cal- 
vary. He came, and Sinai thundered terribly and 
hopelessly no more — the Lionof Judah and the voice of 
the broken mandate, became silent to those wlio sprinkled 
themselves with the blood of this sacrifice — and the 
trumpet tongued song of unnumbered millions in heaven 
smote on prophetic ears like the sound of many waters. 



220 

How precious is Christ to every one who has received 
him, and knows experimentally the value of his redeem- 
ing love ! In vain have the flowery epithets of the magni- 
loquent East exhausted their perfumes on the Savior's 
name and perfections ; his beauties are yet unspoken — 
undescribed. Every Christian, whether he possess the 
oriental order of character, or the hyperborean frigidity, 
knows how weak and imbecile are the loftiest powers of 
language to describe the chiefest among ten thousand — 
the one altogether lovely. Sun of the morning — the 
Day Spring from on high — the Beauty of holiness — An- 
gel of the covenant — slain Lamb of God — Priest — Pro- 
phet — King — accept our poor attempts to honor thee in 
that world, whose crown of thorns, whose rugged wood, 
whose inhospitable soil were stained with thy blood, freely 
poured for the salvation of its guilty inhabitants. 



EXTRACTS 



From an address delivered March l^th, 1832- before the Young Men^s 
Temperance Society of the cittj of J^eio-York . 

The strength of Rum ! Give me only the pale water 
which nature brews down in the bright chrystal alembics 
of her cloud-crested mountains ! Give me, when I would 
aseail, with strained nerves and the arduous outlay of 
bones and sinews, some mound of opposition, reared full 
and impassable in my path — ^give me only that pure flow 



221 

which followed the stroke of the prophet's rod — give me 
that gush, cool and clear, that bubhled up before Hagar 
and fainting Ishmael — give me only that fluid which 
trickles down the bright sides of our own American 
mountains — gathers into rills in the woody uplands — 
then rolls into broad, beautiful, transparent rivers — 
spreads into lakes, the looking-glasses to reflect all that 
is dark, or soft, or bright, or deep, in the unfathonied 
firmament above — give me these chrystal streams, these 
cool, fever-allaying waves, in health or sickness, when 
the thirst of the last fatal pang shall assail my vitals — 
give me these waters, nntortured and free, until that 
moment when I shall drink the waters of eternal life ! 

* ■je •J5- ^ ^ * * 

I would not hold my respected audience to the maxim 
of Napoleon — that nothing is done while any thing 
remains to do. But I must be plain in my statements 
and pay due deference to the majesty of truth, when 1 
say that, perhaps, the benefits of the temperance refor- 
mation have been less felt in this great city and its 
environs than in most parts of the United States. The 
reasons why this is the case are obvious : — the incessant 
roar and din of business ; the diverse and far gathered 
materials of its population ; the numerous thousands of 
that population, constituting an unwieldly mass through 
which no common impulse is able to run and by which, 
acting in concert, no common cause in morals can be 
carried in a brief space of time. New-York sits down 
in her queenly pride, on her island throne, Avith her 
broad rivers on either side, and the Atlantic wave before 
19 



222 

her. Commerce, from the farthest Ind — from the earth^s 
remotest mart, wings her eagle flight, and pauses only 
when she settles down on the heaving wave of the 
Hudson. Genius holds its high courts of rivalry in the 
professional halls of this modern Tyre. The high minded 
and noble spirited youth from the distant interior throng, 
hither to compete with the best talent of every land in 
the noble rivalry of fortune and honorable fame. In 
hot haste and burning speed the rapid wheels of enterprise 
roll here night and day — and the day is turned into 
night, and the night into day, by the votaries of pleasure 
and by them who tarry long at the wine. No wonder 
that a single voice cannot be heard by more than two 
hundred thousand souls of every name and language 
under heaven. No wonder that amidst all the noble 
and philanthropic enterprises of this great city, that of 
arresting the march of Intemperance, has been neglec- 
ted. Almost every corner of your streets is a testimony 
against Temperance — a sign for the enemy. To these 
depots of ruin the miserable thousands go daily and 
nightly and bear away the drink of demons that cannot 
even cool the tongue, in bottles, cups and utensils of 
every name and size and shape. These drizzling 
streams make up the rills, the rivers of drunkenness, 
that flood and drown nearly twenty thousand of your 
inhabitants. 

Is it possible that there are twenty thousand drunkards 
in the city of New-York ? What an army of wretched- 
ness would answer to the roll call of the morning dram, 
the noontide bitters, or the evening sling ! Array them 



223 

in the broadest square of your city. See them come, 
tottering" with years, and the heavier weight of Intemper- 
ance. They are of both sexes, and of every age. But 
they have a common bond of union. The same, or a 
liquor having a common property, is the drink of all — 
it is drank enormously, as if an ocean might be drained 
to the bottom ; and yet the quenchless thirst rages on 
incessantly, and the universal cry is — / will seek it yet 
again. This is the misery in the aggregate. This is 
*he sum tota). But blasphemy and murder and name- 
less wrongs are in the details. The bloated form — the 
hollow eye — the uncertain step — the palsied limb — the 
fetid breath, all belong to this horror of horrors. Pro- 
bably the individuals of my respected audience may each 
one go from these sacred courts to their private dwell- 
ings, where comfort smiles — where the home of virtue 
and religion is ; and there nothing but images of peace 
and beauty shall meet your eyes. But ah, bestow one 
thought on those thuosands of miserable rooms and 
tenements in this city where vice shelters the heads of 
her forlorn votaries. Oh how bitter the winds of mis- 
fortune whistle around the dwellings of the drunkard ! — 
How his poor partner of life — perhaps, too, a partner 
in the bowl — fades away, and becomes brutish under the 
curse ! 

* ^ * :jt * * * 

Young gentlemen, I will not harrow your feelings, 
nor will I wound the sensibilities of my audience by un- 
covering to view the scenes of wretchedness that may be 
unveiled in this city. But to you, young men, I mus 



224 

appeal, for the apostle's reason, hecaiise ye are strong.--^ 
Is it in your souls to entail lasting wo on the female ! — 
No, you cannot do it. Will you famely stand by and see 
a brutal husband gorge himself with that liquor which 
makes a hell of his home, and rolls the fiery flood of 
ruin over the beauty, the constancy, the affection of his 
once happy bosom friend 1 No, young gentlemen, you 
will dash the cup of wretchedness from his lips — you will 
point the finger of your bitter rebuke towards the wretch- 
ed homicide who sells him the wine of wrath, and 
measures out his wife's tears to him by the pint, the 
quart, the gallon. Ah, how bitterly will you reproach 
the wretch who sells nakedness by the jugfuU to poor, 
needy, innocent, hungry children ! How severely and 
heavily will your curses light upon the seething, hissing 
distillery, the smoke of whose tormenting by fire, goes up 
like a cloud over all our land — even yet goes up like a 
cloud ! May the ruinous lightnings blast, I had almost 
prayed, these brews of strong drink — may christians 
stand as far from them as Lot stood from Sodom in its 
evil day ! May the heavenly time come when the pure 
shall be separated from the vile — when the moat, with- 
out any drawbridge, save that of repentance, shall be as 
wide between the rum-making, the rum-selling, and the 
rum-drinking christian, and the christian of the Lord 
Jesus, I had almost said, as the gulf between Abraham 
and Dives. 

But oh, what hope now mounts up in my bosom. I 
have before me the generous spirits of the present and 
the rising generation. I see those whose hands shall wield 



225 

the inoral power ot* the coming half century. You shall 
stand where drunken millions fell, and speak with a re- 
surrection voice that every world which holds in its 
boundary an intelligent mind shall hear. I call you 
not, with the voice of Hannibal, to scale the Alps ; I call 
you not, like Napoleon^ to dig your chilling way through 
the ice and snows of St. Bernard. But I call you, 
generous warriors in the sacred cause of philanthropy, 
I call 3-0U to a nobler deed. I call upon you to lay out 
your young, unwasted strength in combatting more than 
the mountain passes of the natural world — more than 
to bridge the Atlantic— or uncap the cloudy Andes. I 
ask your war-shout, long, and loudj and tremendous 
against a moral fortress, the work of dark and damned 
centuries — the strong-hold hell. Shout, long and terri- 
ble, the war-cry of your hearts. Let hell hear^ — and 
mutter In groans that the victory is lost— that heaven 
and virtue have overcome* Shout like those who, 
shoulder to shoulder, charged at Bunker's height— like 
those who scaled the ramparts of Yorktown. There ?s 
deliverance in your cry of union. Touch not — taste not 
— handle not— be your motto now and forever. Reject 
the poison from your medicine— and go— if you go the 
way of all the earth—go into eternity sober, and see 
your Judge with every faculty of the blight soul he has 
given you, unimpaired and fresh. Let the ageddrunk-* 
ard see your sunny eyes, and sprightly frames, bidding 
detiance to the ills his spirit-soaked flesh is heir to ; let 
him never see a young man of New- York following in 
his path to ruin. 
19^ 



226 

I would have you all, as one, enact in your hearts the 
oath which Hamilcar administered to the youthful Han- 
nibal on the ehrines of Carthoge : Swear this nighty, 
eternal hatred — not against the Romans — but against a 
power that has laid more than Carthage or Rome in 
ruins. Swear perpetual enmity against the glass — the 
sparkling liquor — tlie intoxicating potation. 

I should have no excuse for my earnestness, young 
gentlemen, at this time, but in the solemn fact that many 
strong men have fallen victims to the habits which we 
all condemn this evening. Many a youth, lovely and 
fresh as you are, has been stretched on an inglorious 
drunkard's bier. Many a star of genius has shot from 
its orbit, and sunk in the murky shades of eternal night.. 
1 tremble while I speak. The dizzy flood has some- 
times entered the sanctuary of God — has made its 
whirlpool in the altar — has invaded the sacred desk — 
and hushed the voice that could plead, like an angel's,, 
the cause of God and man. 



PRIMITIVE CHRIST[ANITY. 

' Peace on earth, good will to man.' 

ChHslmas,. 1830. 

It is said that just before the battle of the pyramids. 
Napoleon subKmely remarked to his soldiers — ' Forty 
centuries are looking down upon you this^ day from the 
tops of the pyramids.' On the amVersary of the advent 
morning, with the song of the advent awgels on our 



2:2"7 

longues, it is lor us to say to each other as christian soL 
diers — Eighteen centuries are looking down upon us from 
the top of Calvary. 

^^e not only have the ancient records, and the early 
examples of Christianity, but we have before us, spread 
like a map, its course and current for eighteen hundred 
years. To the durability of the christian virtues, time, 
which wears away the solid marble, has lent the sanc- 
tion of its power. Imperial Rome, whose capacious em- 
pire on the morning that Jesus was born embraced the 
wide world, has crumbled before the remorseless tooth 
of the hungry years : — Ancient Rome is now but dust — 
}'et Christianity lives — lives forever in our souls to the 
glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. 

It is not by a splendid eulogium on the spirit which 
breathes out from the words of the text that we shall wor_ 
thily celebrate this day. I purpose a wider range — a 
holier theme. I shall scarcely pause to point towards the 
troubled continent of Europe, where tyranny, like some si- 
nuous monster, has so firmly bound the nations in it 
snaky folds that their disenthralment can be effected 
only by a dreadful disruption, a sea of blood. Turning 
away from Paris, whence (he cloud of battle has just roll- 
ed up, I shall scarcely direct your eyes to Belgium 
bleeding at every pore — the streets of her Brussels swept 
with the red artillery of war — and her smoking Antwerp 
a ruinous pile that testifies to heaven against kingly rapine 
and murder. However important the present era in the 
dispensation of Providence may be, there is to us, indi- 
vidually and collectively, a consideration of more impor* 



^28 

laiice than anything in the movements of empires. 'Xhd 
question to us this morning is, What is Christianits" ? — • 
What is the spirit of that great era which was introduced 
by angelic strains, breathed gloriously, by celestial har- 
pers, along the lighted up midnight sky, to the words of 
solemn joy-^Glory to God in the Highest ! Peace on 
earth, good will to men ? 

The words of our text are not so much descriptive of 
the first principles of Christianity as of its effects in pro- 
moting the glory cf God and the happinees of man* 
Here we should make a critical distinction : the result 
is one thing, and the long train of principles or causes 
leading to that result may be very different. Yea, we 
have Christ's own declaration that his coming to our 
earth on his grand mission of love would arm mankind 
in bloody struggles against each other, would disunite 
families, and create us foes in our own households-— 
not on account, indeedj of any defect in the gospel of 
heavenly peace, but the deadly opposition is roused 
by its keen reproofs of sin, its purity, and its stern ques^ 
tionings into the motives and deep purposes of the 

human heart. 

Be ours the pleasant task this advent morning of 
learning from the sacred scriptures what was the religion 
of the early christians — what those, who had seen the 
Lord Jesus, face to face^ considered the distinguishing 
traits of christian character 5 — 'and then a second task, 
pleasant or unpleasant, according to the tenor of our 
lives, will remain for us in comparing our own Christia- 
nity with that of the earliest period of the new dispensa- 



220 

tlon. May the Lord smile upon us and grant his bless- 
ing as we recal the thoughts, repeat the words and ex- 
amine the lives of the primitive disciples, who had the 
privilege of seeing our blessed Jesus in his earthly es- 
tate. More blessed than they shall we be, who, not 
hav^ing seen his mortal form, yet believe on him to the 
saving of our souls ! 

From the multiform manifestations of christian char- 
racter and disposition, I shall only select five general 
points of view, each one sustained by the word of God, 
and casting light around the evidences of primitive 
discipleship. 

THEIR DISPOSITIONS OF HEART TOWARDS GOD 
AND CHRIST. 

There was a time in the religious experience of 
the ancient Christians, when they were under deep 
impressions of their sinfulness and danger. The glorious 
change from darkness to light, was, with them, no illu- 
sion ; it was a cbange in the heart and in the will, pro- 
ducing an affectionate reliance on Christ for salvation. 
Towards God it produced a holy fear and the elevating 
affections of love, hope, joy, and thankfulness. 

Every one of these particulars of ancient christian 
disposition are fully established by the following passages 
of scripture : — Now when they heard this, they were 
pricked in the heart, and said unto Peter and the rest of 
the apostles, men and brethren, what shall we do? Saul, 
trembling with astonishment, said. Lord, what wilt thou 
have me to do ? — The jailer called for a light, and sprang 
in, and came trembling and fell down before Paul and 



230 

Silas, and brought ihem out, and said, sirs, what 
must I do to be saved ? — Know ye not that the unright- 
eous shall not inherit the kingdom of God ? Be not 
deceived ; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor effemi- 
nate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor 
thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor 
extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And 
such were some of you ; but ye are washed, but ye are 
sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord 
Jesus, and by the spirit of our God. — Even when we 
were dead in trespasses and sins hath he quickened us 
together with Christ, and hath raised us up together, and 
made us sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. — We 
give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, praying always for you since we heard of your 
faith and of the love which ye have to all the saints. — 
Remembering without ceasing your work of faith and 
labor of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus 
Christ. We are bound to thank God always for you, 
brethren, as it is meet, because that your faith groweth 
exceedingly, and the charity of everyone of you. — Then 
had the churches rest — walking in the fear of the Lord, 
and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied — 
and Hope maketh not ashamed ; because the love of 
God is shed abroad in our hearts. — Therefore, being jus- 
tified by faith, we have peace with God through our 
Lord Jesus Christ. — And not only so, but we also joy 
in God. — Praising God, and having favor with all the 
people. 

The numerous emphatic expressions in the foregoing 



231 

citations speak with an angel's voice of the affections of 
heart which the ancient disciples cherished towards their 
Creator and Redeemer. 

THEIR ATTENTION TO THE ORDINANCES. 

The great gospel itself they received with joy and 
reverence — they w^ere baptized — they often read the 
Holy Scriptures — they commemorated the dying of 
their ascended Lord at the sacramental table — they 
were often found on their knees in social prayer, in se- 
cret prayer ; in the delightful employment of public wor- 
ship they were found late at night and early in the 
morning — and, unlike those of any other religion under 
heaven, they prayed for their enemies. 

I establish every one of those traits of ancient dis- 
cipleship by a second appeal to the early writings of the 
church : — Then they that gladly received his word were 
baptized — and the same day there were added to them 
about three thousand souls. — Crispes, the chief ruler of 
the Synagogue, believed on the Lord with all his house ; 
and many of the Corinthians hearing, believed and were 
baptized. — These were more noble than those in Thes- 
salonica, in that they received the word with all gladness 
of mind, and searched the scriptures daily whether 
these things were so. When ye received the word of 
God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the 
word of men. — Continuing daily in the temple, with one 
accord, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat 
their meat with gladness and singleness of heart. Peter 



232 

went up upon the house top to pray, about the sixth hour. 
At midnight, Paul and Silas prayed and sang praises 
unto God, and the prisoners heard them. — And upon 
the first day of the week, when the disciples came toge- 
ther to break bread, Paul preached unto them, ready to 
depart on the morrow, and continued his speech until 
midnight. Stephen cried with a loud voice, lay not this 
sin to their charge. 

THEIR TEMPER AND CONDUCT IN SOCIETY. 

The leading particulars of their temper and conduct 
towards others may be classed under the general heads 
of great esteem, care and love for their ministers, and 
an abundant reciprocity in return ; unbounded affection 
to all the brethren ; charity and kindness to those in 
want ; unanimity of heart in promoting the temporal and 
spiritual good of those around them ; diligence in spread- 
ing the glorious news of salvation from the upper waters 
of the Nile to the lonely Island of Britain, — united with 
a wide separation of interests from the wicked. 

For proofs 1 again appeal to the unerring word : — 
My temptation which was in my flesh, ye despised not, 
nor rejected ; but received me as an angel of God, even 
as Christ Jesus. Peter was kept in prison, but prayer 
was made without ceasing of the Church for him. 
Oh, ye Corintliians, our mouth is open unto you ; our 
heart is enlarged. But as touching brotherly love ye need 
not that I write unto you, for ye yourselves are taught 
of God to love one another. Then the disciples, every 



233 

man according to his ability, determined to send relief 
unto the brethren which dwelt in Judea. The multitude 
of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul ; 
neither said any of them that aught of the things which 
he possessed was his own, but they had all things in 
common ; neither was there any among them that lacked. 
But I have written unto you not to keep company, if any 
man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, 
or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extor- 
tioner. 

THEIR PERSONAL VIRTUES. 

Their deportment was sober ; they were humble in 
view of their own sinfulness ; they were patient and even 
joyful under afflictions ; they were willing to die ; they 
were full of happiness in the prospect of eternity. 

The following passages are only a few of those that 
describe the sterling virtues of the ancient saints-; — 
wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them 
to the same excess of riot. Unto me who am the least 
of all saints is this grace given that I should preach 
among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. 
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom 
I am the chief. So that we ourselves glory in you in 
the churches of God, for your patience and faith in all 
your persecutions and tribulations that ye endure — For 
ye had compassion on me in my bonds, and took joyfully 
the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that ye 
.have in heaven a better and an enduring substance. But 
we gloiy in tribulation also, knowing that tribulation work- 
20 



234 

eth patience. For 1 am in a strait betwixt two, having 
a desire to depart and be with Christ ; which is far betteir. 
Oh, death, where is thy sting ? Oh grave where is thy 
victory ? 

THEIR SUFFERINGS FOR CHRISt's SAKE. 

Their sufferings have no parallel in the annals of human 
misery — The founders of no other doctrine encount- 
ered persecution like theirs. Reviled and hunted from 
kingdom to kingdom, they wandered amidst the moun- 
tains of Judea, Greece or Italy, clothed in the skins of 
beasts that were more merciful to them than their savage 
persecutors. — Violent dealhs were the early rewards of 
all the apostles. It was in those murderous times an act of 
great self-denial to profess the name of Christ before men. 
Yes, the primitive christians suffered. Hear the rela- 
tion which a few of them gave of their trials : — When they 
had called the apostles and beaten them, they commanded 
that they should not speak in the name of Jesus. Cast 
one out of the city and stoned him. They stoned Ste-^ 
phen, calling upon God and saying, Lord Jesus, receive 
my spirit. — At that time there was a great persecution 
against the church, and they were all scattered abroad 
throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria. Herod 
killed James the brother of John, with the sword. The 
Jews stirred up the devout and honorable woman and 
the chief men of the city, and raised persecution against 
Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them out of their coasts. 
When they had laid many stripes upon Paul and Sijas, 
they cast them into prison. 
These numerous elucidations of ancient chrislianclijar? 



236 

acter cannot but give us the form and body of Christianity. 
This was religion. This was the church arrayed for the 
battle. This was the glorious bride which angels wel- 
comed to the New Jerusalem. This was the heavenly 
spirit of Jesus, embodied in the hearts of his faithful, con- 
fiding followers. This was the sunlike form before which 
the moral glooms that hung over the whole world, like a 
black eternity, were to roll away, and admit immortal 
splendor from above. This was the perfect form of 
spiritual beauty, rising like a vision of heaven upon a 
world of sin. It was the new creation which filled satan 
with astonishment and dismay. He saw the Lion of ihe 
tribe of Judah wrench unharmed the death arrow of hell- 
ish malice from his opened side, and with tremendous 
power unclasp the sealed book which held beneath its 
adamantine lock the fates of earth's hitherto hopeless 
millions. He saw, and fell like lightning from heaven. 
Hell echoed back to the far earth his yell of despair. 
The sun hid his face. The crazy rocks and mountains 
shuddered with the spasms of an internal earthquake. 
The dead, untimely, opened their glazing eyes upon a 
scene they could not comprehend, nor take into the ray- 
less sockets of those windows of the soul long darkened 
by death. 

My dear hearers ! is this religion yours? Have you 
the witness in your bosoms that you stand on the foun- 
dation of the apostles and first christians? Have you, like 
them, felt your sinfulness and danger without Christ in a 
world that was passing away from you like an arrow shot 
out into thin air ? Have you, like them, fled to him, 



236 

as Peter on the troubled sea, saying, save, Lord, or we 
perish ? Did a light break out in the heavens above you 
in the moment of your extremity ? Did the tempest of 
your soul assuage — the loud billows of divine wrath hush 
up their roarings before the rebuke of Him whom winds 
and waves and worlds obey ? Did the calm morning of 
heavenly peace shine into your hearts with a sweet powerj 
before which the thick darkness of your souls fled away ?- 
And when your joys flowed like a wide and deep river, 
was Christ your theme and your all ? Did you find him 
precious to your souls as the loved light of your own ex- 
istence ? Did you believe him able to guide you , Hke a 
strong angel , through the vicissitudes of time , through 
sickness and pain and the chilling darkness of the grave to 
your final home , where the shadowy , lean , and shapeless 
form of death shall never enter ? Did you , who one? 
despised the terrors of the Lord , begin to have a holy fear 
creep through your frames atremembrance of the Ineffable 
One — love and hope mount up in your bosoms in view of 
the perfections of Eternal Benevolence ? Did you rejoice 
in God more than in the abundance of wealth , or did you 
find yourselves at peace with the great monarch of eter- 
nity, or did a song of thankfulness break from your 
fervent lips when the honor of God was precious to 
redeemed thousands ? 

Have you observed the ordinances of Christ's gra- 
cious appointment ? Have you met your beloved Lord 
at the table which he has spread until the world shall end 
on which to lay out the memorials of his dying love ? 
Have you delighted to read the scriptures as if they 



237 

were bequests from an earthly relative, conveying more 
than tlie wealth of the Indias to you and yours forever ? 
Ha\ e you, like your ascended and now glorified Savior, 
spent the night in secret prayer, wrestling in inexpressible 
desires with Him who never slumbers on the high watch 
tower of universal rule? Have you, like your Savior, 
prayed fervently for those whose deep, causeless malice 
would take away your lives ? Have you loved, esteem- 
ed, and prayed for those whom the Holy Spii'it hath 
placed over you in the ministry of reconciliation ? Have 
you taken upon you the full burden of their wants? 
Have you stepped forward to defend them when assailed 
by malicious tongues ? Have you from the impulses of 
christian love to your brethren relieved them when in 
./-ant — covered their faults with the mantle of charity— 
.^ut up your ears against defamatory reports respecting 
he conduct or principles of those of whom the world is not 
worthy ? Have you, when assembled in congregation to 
promote religious efforts acted with one mind — the unity 
of one with the strength of thousands ? Have your hearts 
and ears been open to the calls of the heathen world, 
who are absolutely starving by millions for the crumbs of 
spiritual knowledge which are thrown away in christian 
lands ? Have you said in your hearts of the wicked who 
are in worldly prosperity, come not, oh my soul, into 
their tabernacle, and to them let not mine honor be 
united ? Have you been sober in your deportment as 
though all the eyes of immoilality were looking out from 
every cloud and star upon you, and the never sleeping 
eye of the Watchman of Israel ? Have you been humble 



236 

like those who have entailed woe and disobedience upoEi 
themselves and owe all they have to mercy^ unspeakable 
mercy ? When afflictions gathered around you, over- 
shadowing all your worldly prospects, have you been 
patient under the heavy hand of bereavement, and 
blessed the Lord who took far away, into the darkness of 
the grave, your beloved friend ? When fever and sick- 
ness left their imperious messages for your own selves, 
and summoned you in seeming haste to leave the scenes 
of time, were you willing to go alone the dreary journey 
from whence no traveller returns ; or when eternity was 
apparently near, were you filled with joy that your sure 
reward was so nigh — your crown of everlasting life so 
close to your mortal brows ? Have you gladly seen your 
worldly expectations fade for Christ's sake ? Have you, 
without a wish to follow them, seen your gay and plea- 
sure loving friends, take another path from that in which 
you chose to walk — and have you joyfully borne re- 
proach, calumny and angry words on account of your 
faithfulness to the cause of the Redeemer ? 

If the sincere answer to all these questions is in the 
affirmative, you are indeed christians ; you have a Christ- 
mas blessing which worlds sold to purchase could not 
buy, nor hell, roused up to fury, destroy. 

Contemplating this subject a threefold figure of un- 
paralleled grandeur rises on the mind. It is a view of 
Time and Eternity and Religion. Time hath a swift 
motion like one in haste to be gone. It had a begining and 
must soon end. Detached portions of it are passing away 
hke the torn clouds before a driving hurricane. Since 



239 

the last anniversary of this blessed day, a year has gone 
to join * the years beyond the flood ;' and the whole ex- 
tent of time, through thousands of years, is but the length 
of a fragment broken off from eternity. Eternity ! oh, 
who shall describe it? Who hath returned from its echo- 
less shores to tell its secrets ! One writer remarks that 
when the hour shall be inquired by those who are suffering 
the eternal penalty for despising the blood of a Savior, 
the only answer will be that of a solemn voice, pro- 
nouncing along the bosom of their darkness the indes- 
cribable answer — eternity, eternity, eternity ! 

Connected both with time and eternity, Religion throws 
her radiance over two worlds. Alas, alas, there is one 
world where she never comes ; there is one world un- 
visited by Hope's bright star. Religion stands on the 
banks of the swift rolling river which sweeps empires 
and thrones and cities and men to their final, changeless 
destinations. 

In a world where universal ' glory to God in the High- 
est' shall be the universal anthem, it will not be a cause 
of grief to us that, departing from the usual strain of chris- 
tian triumph and gratulation on this occasion, we have 
walked up towards Calvary, from whence the stream of 
salvation, destined to roll through and overflow the na- 
tions who rise under the gospel dispensation, gushes out 
as from an unclosed fountain. We saw mists and fogs 
and.clouds and storms lour around the river of life — yet 
it borrowed no gloom or sadness — neither did it roll one 
turbid wave to soil the lowly, but lovely flowers that 
delighted to linger on its peaceful ban^is. If the at(n|os- 



240 

phere now around us be brighter — if the stream of sal- 
vation be broader — if the bow of the eternal promises, 
one end resting on earth and the other planted on one of 
the sapphire stones of the New Jerusalem, be painted with 
livelier colors on the dark, retreating vapors of the storm 
—if signs in the heavens and commotions among the na- 
tions give token of a second advent, when Christ shall de- 
scend in a chariot of cloud, as he went up on the ascen- 
sion morning from Olivet — if eighteen centuries looking 
down upon us from the top of Calvary, and the unborn 
centuries looking up to us for the body and fashioning of 
times to come, — confer any importance and honor and 
glory to the high station and dignity with which Heav*en 
has invested the present generation, — to God be all the 
praise — to us the boundless joy, 



IRgJeVB 






